LIBRO

KEMESHK Risorse idriche e territorio

di Angelo Ferrari, Pietro Ragni

The water in Iran is from the ancient time a peculiar characteristic in the relationship between the man and the territory. Who owned the water was able to rule the oasis and so to control the land, the communication and commercial roads and the human settlement; almost nothing has changed in the collection and distribution of water in this area since quite recent period. A large portion of Iranian water supply was assured by the hundreds of thousands qanats built in the deserted and pre-deserted areas. The qanat is a typical aqueduct which was realized in the area of nowadays Iran and Afganistan and adopted also in other region in Central Asia, Middle and Near East and in the Sahara regions of the Mediterranean states of Africa. Each qanat started from the discovered water spring, sometime also deep up to 200 m under the surface; in that place it was dig the mother-well, then, along the route useful to bring the water in the area to be irrigated, a long sequence of well were dug with a room on the bottom, then all the underground rooms, from the place where the water has to spill (mouth of the qanat) up to the last well before the mother-well were joined and finally the sector with the mother-well was broken allowing the water to flow from the spring to the selected area along a tunnel high about 1,5 m. The underground course was important to avoid the water evaporation along the way and the long set of air shaft were used to inspect the tunnel and to secure the maintenance of the whole qanat. The mouth of the qanat was an important place for the community living there and it has a typical organization in the majority of the cases: there is a tank to collect the water, then a wash place (for the clothes in the morning and the dishes in the afternoon), then a branch for public baths and another for the irrigation of the land. Still nowadays, in Iran, the qanats provide approximately the 50% of the water for agriculture and social needs, also in the capital, Teheran, the water coming from the qanats supported the needs of more than two millions of citizens up to few years ago. Kemeshk is a little rural village in the South of Iran; it lies in one of the long and narrow valleys of Zagros mountains, about 40 km far from the Persian Gulf coasts. Nowadays there is a great water crisis in the Kameshk area, where the 95% of the water supply depends on the underground waters; in consequence of this it is limited the use of water for green spaces, for car washing and the water supply during the weekends is portioned. Moreover the authorities are trying to seal all illegal wells, which are the majority of the existing water sources. The reason of this water shortage is mainly in the demographic increase of the region and in the consequent increasing of local water need for agriculture, social and productive uses. Near to Kemeshk there is a little river and in this area, in a different way than in the other Iranian situations, the qanat water flows under the fields, in the northern part of the village, and is lead into the river to reduce the high level of saltiness and the presence of sulfur on the water surface; in that way it is possible to use the amended river water in the agriculture. Kemeshk qanat system catches the water in the diapir area of the mountains and bring it to the valley, going directly in the river; in the past, along the qanat course there were some wells and several mills, but now they are closed. The system has five mother-wells and eight branches connected in an articulate net of underground tunnels with a total length of approximately 8000 m and with about 450 shafts at an average distance of 16,25 m one from the other; the highest depth is for the mother-well of the first branch (23 m , altitude 372 m). Nowadays authorities and technicians are working to solve the water shortage emergency, but it is important to stress that all possible new buildings and infrastructures