MAKHACHKALA, June 2 – RIA Dagestan. The volume of drinking groundwater extracted in Russia currently amounts to about 12 million cubic meters per day, but the resource is not evenly spread across the country. Regions including Karelia, Kalmykia, Dagestan, Chuvashia and Astrakhan Oblast experience a shortfall of underground drinking water, TASS reports, quoting Alexander Kozlov, the head of the Natural Resources Ministry.
As to Kozlov, Russian specialists have explored roughly 19,000 groundwater deposits with total reserves of around 72 million cubic meters daily. While the overall supply is sufficient to satisfy demand, some regions face local deficits. The top official attributed the shortage to several factors: naturally high mineralization in some places, permafrost in others and low yields from aquifers in still others. Besides, Kozlov says, large cities depend on surface water from rivers and reservoirs to secure supply.