Claimed Benefits SSP's backers claim the project will irrigate a 'command area' of 1.8 million hectares (4.45m acres) in Gujarat and 75,000 hectares (185,000 acres) in Rajasthan; have an installed power generation capacity of 1450 megawatts; provide domestic water to over 2.35 million people in 8235 villages and 135 towns in Gujarat; and prevent flooding downstream. Narmada Flow: The NWDT allocated the Narmada water on the assumption that in three out of every four years at least 28 million acre feet (MAF) (34.5 billion cubic metres) of water flowed down the river. However measurements of the actual flow between 1948 and 1993 show that the 75% dependable flow has been only 22.75 MAF. This reduces the share of water available to Gujarat by at least 16%. Irrigation Efficiency: The irrigation efficiency of SSP (the amount of irrigation water which actually reaches crops) is assumed in project documents to be 60%. Experience with existing irrigation schemes and independent studies of the SSP irrigation plans indicate that this is unrealistically high. The World Bank's 1991 'India Irrigation Sector Review' states: "Irrigation efficiency in India has often been assumed at 60%, whereas a worldwide sample of irrigation commands indicates 37-40% efficiency in areas of low rainfall under reasonably good management, and in higher rainfall zones, an average of 23%. Most irrigation commands in India probably have an irrigation efficiency of 20-35%. If assumed efficiency is 60% and actual efficiency is 30%, actual water availability will be half the assumption at design." Narmada Sagar: The potential benefits of SSP are based on the assumption that it will be able to exploit regulated releases of water from the Narmada Sagar Projects (NSP) upstream in Madhya Pradesh. NSP (which consists of one major dam (Narmada Sagar) and two medium ones (Omkareshwar and Maheshwar)) and SSP are supposed to work as part of a single system. The NWDT stated that MP should "complete the construction of Narmada Sagar Dam . . . concurrently with or earlier than the construction of Sardar Sarovar Dam." According to the World Bank's 1985 Staff Appraisal Report for SSP, NSP would be operational by 1993. However, construction on Narmada Sagar began only in 1992 and is now virtually at a halt with the dam not yet above foundation level. The Chief Minister of MP has recently said that the state does not have the money to continue NSP or other dams on the Narmada. According to the NWDT, without Narmada Sagar the irrigation water available to SSP would be reduced by at least 17%; according to the World Bank, the available water would be reduced by 30%. British hydrological consultants HR Wallingford (commissioned by the World Bank in 1992), concluded that the Sardar Sarovar reservoir would fill up with sediment two to three times faster - severely shortening the lifetime of the project - if NSP is not built. Unsuitability of Land for Irrigation: Large parts of the area slated to be irrigated have soils which are highly prone to waterlogging and salinization and are unsuited to canal irrigation. Water Intensive Crops: Despite assertions from GoG that water-intensive sugar cane growing will not be allowed in the SSP command area, five large sugar cane factories are being built close to the head of the main canal. Whilst the area to be irrigated has been calculated on the assumption that an average of 320 mm of water will be delivered to the fields each year, sugar cane requires up to 3000 mm. If water is heavily consumed by sugar cane plantations in the initial reaches of the canal system, much less water will be available for users further from the dam. Little Water for Most Drought-Prone Areas: The project proponents claim that SSP will solve the severe drought problems of Kutch and Saurashtra, the two driest parts of Gujarat. However only 1.6% of the total cultivable land of Kutch and 9.24% of the cultivable land of Saurashtra are in the SSP command area. Both these areas are at the tail end of the canal system and will be severely affected by the water shortages in the system - all the available water is likely to be consumed by the less needy areas of central Gujarat before it ever reaches Kutch and Saurashtra. The central government and the World Bank have stated that the infrastructure to deliver water to Kutch will not be fully developed until 2025 AD. Gujarat is currently spending 80% of its total irrigation budget on SSP, depriving smaller irrigation and water supply projects in Kutch and Saurashtra of funds. These projects could help alleviate the water crisis in the drought-prone areas of Gujarat decades before they have a chance of getting water from the Narmada. Power Benefits: The power from SSP is to be generated from a 1200 MW powerhouse at the dam and a 250 MW powerhouse at the head of the canal. However the power actually produced will be much less than the installed capacity, mainly because increasing amounts of water will be diverted into the canals, reducing the volume of water available to flow through the turbines at the dam. When the canal network is fully developed the dam powerhouse will become redundant as only the highest monsoon flood flows will be allowed to pass downstream. GoG's own figures show that firm power generation will drop from 425 MW during the first stage of the project to a meagre 50 MW at full irrigation development. Without NSP the power generation potential of SSP will be reduced by a further 25-28% according to World Bank and GoG figures. As 16% less water is available in the Narmada than assumed by the NWDT, the power benefits will be reduced further. According to the NWDT, Gujarat will get only 16% of the power from SSP, the rest being split between Maharashtra (27%) and MP (57%). Pumping water to the Kutch and Saurashtra branch canals would consume around 70 megawatts after allowing for the small amounts of power generated by turbines in the canal system. Large amounts of power would also be required to pump groundwater into the canals, an integral part of the irrigation plans; to drain the command area soils; and to operate the gates and other structures regulating the flow in the canals. Drinking Water: No plans have been completed for how the drinking water is to be delivered to consumers, nor has any money been allocated for this component of the project. In 1992 an NCA publication estimated that tens of billions of rupees ($1 = c.30 rupees) would be required to provide drinking water for the villages of Kutch and Saurashtra. Gujarat's water allocation under the NWDT Award did not allow for any village water supply. The Nigam Chairman admitted in 1992 that 236 of the villages supposed to receive water are in fact uninhabited, an illustration of how the drinking water benefits have been exaggerated. Flood Control: SSP will severely restrict downstream flows, encouraging people to move into the areas now prone to flooding. The reservoir, however, has not been designed to hold back the occasional large floods at the end of the monsoon, when the reservoir will already have been filled in preparation for the next dry season and will therefore have no spare flood storage capacity. Hydrological consultants HR Wallingford state that: "Prior to Narmada Sagar Dam, a large flood occurring in the second half of the monsoon period may be attenuated by less than 20% . . . The principal danger is that reduced flood risk will lead to encroachment onto the flood-prone land which may negate any [flood control] benefit obtained [from SSP]."