Water Resource

Water resource management in Georgia is a major issue because of its significant impact on human health.

According to estimates, the volume of water abstractor from natural sources amounts to approximately 2 800 million m³/year. Agricultural abstraction amounted to 1 509 million m³/year (54%), municipal abstraction to 929 million m³/year (33%), and industrial abstraction to 362 million m³/year (13%).

Of the 632 million m³/year discharged into surface-water bodies, 82 million m³/year (13%) are polluted and untreated, 300 million m³/year (48%) comply with standards and do not require any treatment, and 250 million m³/year (39%) are gone through decontamination plants.

The following problems in water use and protection require urgent attention:

• Supply of safe drinking water to the population;
• Avoidance of surface water pollution

Water Supply

There are about 1 600 water supply lines in Georgia, which annually provide 620 million m³ of fresh water. Of this, 90% is used in cities and 10% in rural settlements. The main source of fresh water is subsurface water that is used to satisfy 90% of demand through the centralized water- carriage system. Georgia's public water supply facilities are facing severe problems. Drinking water confinements are common in most cities, because of energetic crises, particularly in the summer. 95% of the centralized supply networks in rural areas have not being functioning for more than one year now, and rural populations are using water for drinking from rivers, wells and other natural sources where water might be contaminated. Most critical are the following problems:

• Existing water intakes cannot meet the demands of the population in rapidly growing cities. No water-intakes have been rebuilt or expanded since 1987.
• Most water-intakes and most parts of the supply network are in poor condition. Reconstruction or repair is not carried out for lack of funds;
• Significant losses of water, which according to informal estimates amount to 25-30% (the exact amount of water losses is impossible to estimate due to the lack of water meters);
• Water pumping stations frequently cease to function because of power shortages;
• Drinking water is sometimes contaminated with water discharged through the sewage system (bacteriological contamination);
• Sanitary protection zones do not satisfy requirements.

Thus, water quality does not often meet existing state standards, creating threats of infection.

Surface Water

Although there has been a relative improvement in the quality of surface water in recent years, due to the critical state of the country's economy, which has led to a decrease of fertilizer usage and pesticides hereupon, improved of surface-water quality. It is evident that with the current upturn in industrial activity, the impact of the pollution on the environment will increase significantly.

The main point sources of pollution are municipal sewage water, industrial wastewater and untreated sewage from medical establishments. Non-point (diffuse) sources of pollution are agricultural discharges. Municipal sewage is the main source of surface water pollution by organic compounds and phosphates.

The most polluted areas are:

• In the Mtkvari River basin (Caspian Sea):
  • The Mtkvari River downstream from the cities of Borjomi, Gori, Tbilisi and Rustavi,
  • The Vere River in the Tbilisi area,
  • The Alazani river downstream from Telavi,
  • The Algeti downstream from Marneuli,
  • The Suramula River downstream from Khashuri,
• In the Black Sea basin:
• The Rioni River downstream from the city of Kutaisi and in the vicinity of Poti,
• The Black Sea along the Adjara and Abkhazeti coastline.

The main sources of surface water pollution are urban and rural municipal sewage waters (which accounted for 60% of the total volume of polluting water until 1993, and up to 90% since 1993).

One of the most acute problems in Georgia is the absence of decontamination plants in medical institutions and infectious diseases hospitals, TB hospitals etc.

Existing hot spots include:

• The Kvabliani River and its tributary, the Otskhe, downstream from Abastumani;
• The Mtkvari River and its tributaries, the Borjomula River and the Gujaretistskali River, in the Borjomi region;
• The Mtkvari and its tributary, the Ksani, in the Mtskheta region;
• The Vere River within the city of Tbilisi.

Agricultural pollution and are impacted on the country’s water resources. Fertilizers and pesticide residues pollute surface waters. There are no exact data concerning the waste load on reservoirs resulting from agricultural practice. Numerous stocks of banned fertilizers and pesticides have been discovered in many regions of Georgia, but no measures exist to protect surface and subsurface waters and human health from pollution.

Untreated waste from stock farms and poultry factories is another source of surface water pollution. At present, the great majority of them are not functioning, but this problem will materialize in near future with the recovery of stock farms and poultry factories. Another major polluter is the irrigation system, which is not supplied with drainage- collection networks. Consequently, water resources are polluted with fertilizers and pesticides.

The Black Sea

Almost one third of the entire land area of continental Europe drains into the Black Sea. The coastline is about 320 km in length. The Black Sea is an almost closed ecosystem with very valuable and often unique recreational area. For last decades, pollution of the sea and superfluous fishery has resulted deficiency of fish (now 3-4 varieties remain).

Presently, the Black sea is considered as one of the most polluted seas. The major sources of polluted are ballast water from ships using the ports of Batumi, and Poti, wastes from oil refinery at Batumi, and also solid wastes accumulated on the coastal areas and that discharge by the rivers. One of the main sources of pollution is the river Rioni, which washes off industrial and household wastes in the sea.

The basic substances polluting the Black sea are: petrochemicals, ammonia nitrogen and nitrate nitrogen, pesticide chemicals. The rivers carrying the most pollution to the Black Sea are the Gubistskali, Bartskhana, Ogaskura, Lagoba, Rioni, Enguri and Besletistskali. 4 800 ton of organic compounds and 3 500 tone of petrochemicals discharged into the Black Sea from point sources. In all seasons, the sea surface is patched with thin sheets of oil. Black Sea biotas, including aquatic vegetation and mussel, valuable fish, etc., are undergoing severe change as a result of ecological degradation. For physical reasons, the sea is virtually dead below about 180 meters (the Black Sea is the biggest natural anoxic basin in the world): in some seasons, the upper level of the hydrogen sulphide layer rises to 75 m.

The most urgent theme is the protection of a coastland and ante-erosion processes. The construction of platinum on the Black Sea Rivers’ basins created serious problems to a coastland. It is known, that they actually block a solid flow (being "a building material" for a coastland).

After of platinum’s constructions, it is necessary to fill the estuary of rivers by that quantity of hard materials, which was washed off by the river, under natural conditions, but because of lack of funds, this process is actually failed, that represents threat to a coastland. Subsequent of development activities on a coastal zone is obliged to environmental impact assessment.

Future coastal development activities should be subject to EIA procedures to ensure that adequate precautions are taken. This also applies to transponder projects: for example, the planned development of a series of dams on the Chorokhi river (Turkey - Georgia) in Turkish territory to exploit its considerable hydropower potential carries serious risks for coastal erosion on the Ajarian coast. Cooperation between the two countries on this matter has begun and will hopefully produce decisions that are acceptable to both parties. Without financial and organizational support at a state level of each country, it is impossible to solve both ecosystem problems and following suspension of degradation.