Poor planning: How Chennai, one of the wettest cities, ran out of water

The ancient south Indian port has become a case study in what can go wrong when industrialisation, urbanisation and a booming metropolis paves over flood plain to meet demand for new homes, factories

Climate change is bringing rising sea levels and increased flooding to some cities around the world and drought and water shortages to others. For the 11 million inhabitants of Chennai, it’s both.
 

India’s sixth-largest city gets an average of about 1,400mm (55 inches) of rainfall a year, more than twice the amount that falls on London and almost four times the level of Los Angeles. Yet in 2019 it hit the headlines for being one of the first major cities in the world to run out of water—trucking in 10 million liters a day to hydrate its population. This year,