Benefits of Nagara Estuary Barrage During the Drought of 2000
Precipitation in July and August, 2000 was only about 40 percent of normal, and a water shortage occurred in the Kiso river system. During this period, however, drinking water newly made available by the Nagaragawa Estuary Barrage, Agigawa Dam and Misogawa Dam was supplied to the affected areas including the central region of Mie Prefecture and the service area of the Aichi Canal. This prevented serious consequences such as water supply interruptions.
According to Mie Prefectural government's calculations, without the water from the Nagaragawa Estuary Barrage, water supply would have been suspended for about three to eight hours in the Chusei region with 180,000 people in 64,000 households. In the service area of the Aichi Canal and other areas, the water from the reservoir of the Makio Dam would have been used up and nearly 1.25 million people would have suffered from serious water cutbacks and water supply suspensions.
Precipitation quantities were about 20 to 40% smaller than normal in the Chubu region (central part of Japan) in the spring and summer of 2005. Water volume in reservoirs in the Kiso River System decreased at a higher rate than in 1994 when the worst drought occurred in the past several years. Serious drought damage was of concern. In the Chita Peninsula region of Aichi Prefecture, however, no adverse effects on drinking water use including water supply cutbacks were caused owing to stable water supply from the Nagaragawa Estuary Barrage via the Nagara water supply system.
The water provided by the Nagaragawa Estuary Barrage was also used effectively by conveying an unused quantity of 0.66 m3/sec to an area adjacent to the Chita Peninsula region in the service area of Aichi Canal via the Nagara water supply system. Thus, the effects of the drought were mitigated in the service area of the Aichi Canal where EXPO 2005 AICHI JAPAN was being held.
Contribution to water utilization during the drought of 2005
