Residential training on Rainwater Harvesting and Stormwater Management for Climate Resilient River Cities

Centre for Science and Environment (CSE) in partnership with National Mission for Clean Ganga (NMCG), Ministry of Jal Shakti, Govt. of India conducted the residential training on “Rainwater Harvesting and Stormwater Management for Climate Resilient River Cities” from February 21-23, 2024. The training was conducted, under the CSE-NMCG capacity building initiative on ‘Making Ganga basin studies water-sensitive’.

The training was aimed to capacitate state / municipal functionaries and other sector players on issues, challenges, and management of rainwater and stormwater in urban areas.

For the training a total of 32 nominations received from across India and attended by 17 participants, all of which were govt officials from Central Public Works Department (CPWD) Delhi, Groundwater Department Rajasthan, NMCG- State Programme Management Group (SPMG) Bihar, Urban Development and Environment Department (UDED) Madhya Pradesh, Delhi Jal Board (DJB) Delhi and Tamil Nadu Urban Habitat Development Board (TNUHDB) Tamil Nadu etc.

The training was conducted at CSE’s residential training campus, Anil Agarwal Environment Training Institute (AAETI), Nimli Rajasthan between February 21-23, 2024. 

The main objective of the training was to capacitate the officials on the issue of water management in cities through rainwater harvesting and stormwater management. The guest faculties from reputed institutions like Central Groundwater Board (CGWB) and National Institute of Hydrology (NIH) were invited to deliver lectures on specific topics.

The group exercises on calculation of rainwater harvesting potential, storm water modelling through softwares added more interest to the participants and want to use such exercise in their respective departments for effective planning and implementation. The brainstorming sessions during the training were done to make the training more interactive and for active engagement of the participants. Each brainstorming session had some unique activities followed by 

Apart from the classroom sessions, a field visit to East Nizamuddin colony was organized to understand the implementation of rainwater harvesting systems at community level, where CSE had provided the technical guidance for the implementation. AAETI also has live models of rainwater harvesting, where participants visited to understand the implementation at institutional level.

The overall training was well appreciated by the participants. They appreciated the content, faculty, mode of training, live models at AAETI and other logistical arrangements at AAETI.