Drought looming: half of Guanajuato suffers from lack of water

Published February 25th, 2022

Half of the state of Guanajuato suffers from a lack of water. A study by the National Water Commission (Conagua) indicates that at least 25 municipalities in the state have water shortages.

In the Monitor of Drought in Mexico, carried out by the Conagua, it is indicated that approximately 42.8 percent of the territory of the state of Guanajuato is “abnormally dry”.

This classification is one step below drought. Conagua points out that 25 municipalities of the 46 in Guanajuato are experiencing this situation as of February 15 of this year.

Most affected cities
The federal agency does not detail all the municipalities that are in this situation. However, a map accompanying the study shows that some of the cities with water problems are San Miguel de Allende, San Felipe, Dolores Hidalgo, Ocampo, among others.

The document also reports the percentage of areas with drought in the 26 Basin Councils (Conagua). The Lerma River and Chapala stand out in these areas.

58.5 percent of this area suffers from water scarcity and is classified as abnormally dry. 1.7 percent is in moderate drought and 39.8 percent is unaffected.

At the national level, the Conagua documented 972 abnormally dry municipalities, 201 in moderate drought, 17 in severe drought, and 6 in extreme drought.

“As of February 15, 2022, the area with moderate to extreme drought (D1 to D3) was 13.15% nationally, 1.22% less than what was quantified as of January 31 of the same year,” the document states.

Lack of water in Santa Catarina is remedied with pipes
Due to the lack of drinking water in the most remote communities located in the Sierra Gorda, the municipal government maintains free “trips” of pipes to supply the vital liquid to the people who need it.

This was informed in an interview by the municipal president Sonia Gracia Toscano, who added that the water shortage is mainly due to the lack of pipelines to these communities since the distance is considerable.

“It is one of the priorities within the work plan to be developed for this triennium, to bet on basic services; electricity, water, drainage, because in times of heat the drought intensifies and the water shortage is much more pronounced in remote communities,” he said.

Therefore, even the situation of the wells is difficult to be able to supply the citizens with the vital liquid, despite the fact that in the last months, the last rains that were registered helped a lot.

Although the pipes are free, there is a fee in the budget for people who want to purchase a water pipe for another purpose, such as filling a swimming pool.

Lake in Xochipilli Park is still dry
After all, the water was drained from the lake in Xochipilli Park and the pond was repaired, it will not be easy to fill it again, at this moment only 10% has been filled.

Arzú Dominic Saucedo Sandoval, director of the Patronato Pro Construcción del Parque Xochipilli, explained that the pond has a capacity of 15 million liters of water, so he estimates that it will be 100 percent full in about 6 or 7 months.

He said that probably in three months there will be enough water to be able to use the boats again.

“The pond has a capacity of 15 million liters of water, it is a lot, in order to fill it to its 100% capacity it will take several months and we will need the help of the environment, right now it is at 10%, we have made little progress, the capacity we have to distribute the pond water is small, compared to the amount that is required”, he mentioned.

He pointed out that an average of 30,000 or 40,000 liters of water enter daily, and for this reason, the difference is not very noticeable, in addition to the water losses due to erosion. In addition, bentonite was placed as part of the maintenance actions, but this material absorbs a large amount of water.

“An exact date for the total filling would be a lie, if I tell you that in three months, maybe in that time it will have enough water to be able to provide the boat service, to be able to reopen it, to be at 100% capacity, we are probably talking about 6 or 7 months, depending on the rains”, he explained.

Water was leaking due to lack of repairs
The lake had not received maintenance for 20 years since the construction of the pond.

The investment was 111,000 pesos and the maintenance work was done by park personnel.

Until before the repair, the park’s lake had a loss of between eight and ten centimeters of water per week, due to cracks in the bottom, which meant that every week around 128 pipes of eight thousand liters each were poured, in addition to having sediments with excess organic matter and a high reproduction of microalgae.

The pond has an area of 8,306 square meters, an average depth of 1.5 meters, and an approximate water volume of 12,458 cubic meters.

The last stage of maintenance consisted of repairing four cracks through which the water was filtering, as well as the application of a bentonite membrane in the low bed and the filling of the pond.