WATER RESOURCES OF THE KINGSTON BASIN, KINGSTON, JAMAICA, AVAILABILITY AND CHALLENGES

Jamaica, the third largest island of the Caribbean, located between latitude 18⁰15’N and longitude 77⁰20’W with a tropical maritime climate is one of the best tourist places in the Caribbean. However in recent years water resources of the island has faced serious challenges both due to climatic and anthropogenic causes. Rainfall is the primary source of water in the country, providing flow in the streams, direct recharge to the limestone and alluvial aquifers, and indirect recharge to the aquifers through the streams. The island is divided into ten hydrologic basins with the smallest and densely populated one being the Kingston basin covering the parish of Kingston the capital of Jamaica. Rainfall distribution pattern of the island shows that the Kingston Basin ( area of 258km² ) has the lowest rainfall resources ie 208MCM as compared to the Blue Mountains North basin which has the maximum resources of 2346MCM. Urbanisation has led to expansion of the land area of the Kingston Metropolitan Area westward and is currently experiencing an annual growth rate of 2.30 percent, which represents the fastest growing of the country's urban areas. Such rapid urbanization is affecting the groundwater resources which has recorded high levels of nitrate ( ~58ppm ) in areas of high population density. Surface water is the major resource of water to the basin which includes the Hope River , diverted to the Hope Filter plant and the Mona Reservoir. Additional sources of water are derived from the eastern parish of St Thomas through the Yallahs pipeline and the streams flowing into the Hermitage dam. Groundwater is derived from the existing ten wells out of 40 wells which existed in the past upto the 2004, but were closed down due to nitrate contamination and saline water intrusion, the second major pollutant of the groundwaters of the basin. The parish suffers from water shortages which became worst in the year 2009-2010 when low-no rainfall caused the levels in the reservoirs to fall < 40% of its total level. Such a problem was aggravated by absence of significant utilization of the well waters due to the high salinity and nitrate levels. Much research is needed for proper utilization of the waters of the basin, building new reservoirs and cleaning up or finding new groundwater resources to meet the growing population of the basin.