Water Management and Supply in a Mining Community – A Case Study of Tarkwa and its Environs

Since mining activities require a lot of water and also increase population of host communities as a result of influx of workers, water resources in mining communities must be efficiently managed. This paper considered the various factors affecting water supply and its distribution in the Tarkwa area, a mining community, to find out the possible reasons for the inadequate water supply to Tarkwa. The maximum flood discharge for a reservoir constructed along the course of the River Bonsa was computed as 81.34 m3 /s using the rational method for the estimation of peak flood flow. The volume of containment of the reservoir was also calculated from hydrographic surveys data to be 25 456 m3. These results were analysed against the water demand vis-a-vis the current population growth. Also the condition of the equipment for pumping water both from the reservoir for treatment and after treatment to the storage tanks from where water is supplied to customers were considered together with the capacity of the treatment plant and the booster station at Bonsaso and Tamso respectively. It was concluded that the reservoir has enough water to meet the demand. However, the problem of inadequate supply was traced to non-regular power supply to both the treatment plant and booster station from where customers are served.