Composite Sustainable Condition Index For Elevated Service Reservoir In Rural Water Supply Scheme

Abstract

The water supply in rural areas have been traditionally overshadowed by the urban water supply, in past but the situation is changing now as the Sustainable Development Goals, calls for water for all. The GoI is committed to achieve the SDG within its timeframe and thus had spent a huge amount in establishing the RWS infrastructure in all 6 lakh plus villages across the country, which is continuing and expect to finish by the mid of the current decade. Every infrastructure has certain service life and suffers operational and environmental abrasion, which requires scheduled preventive maintenance and unscheduled corrective maintenance. The deterioration always starts at micro level and may get enlarged to meso level, if unattended initially, which may in turn lead to either uneconomical maintenance or complete collapse. newlineTo avoid the costly maintenance or complete failure of infrastructure, the protocol for routine inspection and maintenance as per requirement is essential. Albeit a proper management systems is required for cost-effective allocation of limited budgets for deteriorating elements of infrastructure. Visual inspections are one of the most important parts of the system and on the other hand, the non-destructive evaluation (NDE) of components of infrastructure should be primarily included in infrastructure management system. newlineDue to significant role of RCC ESRs in rural water supply and in accordance with the limited funding for management, the remediation strategies have to be prioritized. A conservative assessment may result in unnecessary actions, such as costly strengthening or repairs. On the other hand, any maintenance negligence and delayed actions may lead to heavy future costs or degraded assets. The accuracy of decisions taken by the competent authority relies on the accuracy of the condition assessment which emanates from visual inspection. The RCC ESRs in rural water supply are subjected to damage and deterioration during their service life because of continuous exposures to aggressive envi