Water level rises to 80 percent in Istanbul dams

ISTANBUL

Recent rainfall have been good news for Turkey’s most crowded metropolis Istanbul, as the province was troubled by drought fears earlier this year.

Water levels in the dams supplying the city have finally reached 80 percent thanks to the precipitation.

Data from the Istanbul Water and Sewage Administration (ISKI) showed that the rise in the water level reached 3 percent in one week.

It was at just 19.1 percent in the beginning of 2021, when the city’s water supplies were at alarmingly low levels, but increased by more than three times in three months.

The highest water level was recorded at Ömerli Dam at 97.4 percent, while it reached 96.7 percent in Darlık Dam, 94.6 percent in Elmalı Dam.

The city relies on dams and large ponds for water for its more than 15 million inhabitants.

Overall, these dams have the capacity of storing up to 868.6 million cubic meters of water and the city consumes 2.9 million cubic meters of water on average each day.