CE408 IRRIGATION ENGINEERING

TOPICS: IRRIGATION ENGINEERING

WEEK: 4
LECTURE: 1
LEVEL: 8 T H SEMESTER
PREREQUISITES: NONE
 
COURSE TEACHER: ENGR. KHURAM SALEEM ( khurram
.civil@suit.edu.pk)
ACCESS AT: portal.suit.edu.pk
Civil Engineering Department, SUIT Peshawar
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Canal Irrigation System
A direct irrigation scheme (which makes use of a weir or a barrage) as well as a
storage irrigation scheme (which makes use of a storage dam or a storage
reservoir) necessitates the construction of a networks of canals.

The canals (main, branch, distributary, minor) should be designed properly for a
certain realistic value of peak discharge that they must carry through.

The canals are excavated either in alluvial soil or non alluvial soil, depending
upon which they are called alluvial canals or non alluvial canals.

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A trip to Amandara Headworks
(Malakand)

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 Divide wall
given to pool river water

Arrow head showing

River flow direction
Weir

Swat River at low

discharge

Diverted Canal
Off shooting towards
Left side (LEFT BANK
CANAL)

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Divide wall

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Energy Dissipators

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Main canal (Upper Swat Canal)

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Weir and Canal Regulator

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Alluvial Canals
The soil which is formed by transportation and deposition of silt through the
agency of water, over a course of time, is called the alluvial soil. Canal excavated
in such a soil is called Alluvial Canal.
The silt is deposited near the river banks as a result of floods.
Alluvial soil has a flat slope. Hard foundations are generally unavailable in these
soils thus large dams should be discouraged here.
The river also has the tendency to change course over years due to fine soil.

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Whenever an irrigation structure is to be constructed on such a river special
precautions and design methods are to be adopted. Its not fit for building huge
reservoirs or high dams.
Alluvial soil is very fertile.

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Alluvial Soil Channels and its Hydraulic
Structures

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Non Alluvial Canals
Mountainous regions may go on disintegrating over a period of time resulting in
the formation of rocky plain area, called non alluvial area.
Canals passing through such areas are called non alluvial canals.
It has uneven topography and hard foundations. Rivers passing through such
areas have no tendency to shift their course.
And thus designing hydraulic structures in such zones including large reservoirs
and high dams pose no problem.

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Non Alluvial Channels and their
Hydraulic Structures

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Alignment of Canals
Irrigation canals can be aligned in any of the following three ways:
Water shed canal or ridge canal
Contour canal
Side slope canal

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Ridge Canal
The dividing ridge line between the catchment areas of two streams (River A &
River B) is called the water shed or the ridge. It actually divides the drainage
areas of the two streams.
In areas where land slopes are relatively flat, it is advantageous to align canals
on the water sheds (ridge) as shown clearly in the figure along with the contour
values.
They are called Ridge or water shed canals. This ensures gravity irrigation on
both sides of the canal.

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Alignment of a Watershed or Ridge
Canal
‘ Watershed or Ridge line
(RL 210m) Q
P (RL 200m) A

(RL 195m) B

rA

rB
e

Rive
Riv

Canal

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Contour Canals
In hilly areas rivers flow down in the valley and the ridge line may be hundred of
meters above the river. Its not possible to take canal on top of such a higher
ridge line. So in such areas contour canals are constructed.
Contour canals follow contours on either side of the river, may be left bank or
right bank, not both as shown in the figure.

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Alignment of a Contour Canal
‘
Canal
Rive
r
0
200

20
00
50

19
19

50
00 19
19 0 0

8 50 18
1 5 0

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Side Slope Canal
That canal which is aligned at right angles to the contours is called the side slope
canal. They are called so as they flow along the side slopes. See the coming figure

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Alignment of a Side Slope Canal
‘

Side slope channel

1000 950 900

contours

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Important Terms
Gross Command Area (GCA):
The total area bounded within the irrigation boundary of a project that can be
economically and sufficiently irrigated by that particular project.

It includes the cultivable as well as the uncultivable area like ponds, roads,
forests etc.

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Cultivable Command Area (CCA):
It is only that land of the GCA, on which cultivation is possible. It does not
include the uncultivable part of the GCA like roads, ponds, forests etc. But it
does include fallow land and pastures.
Because at a given time, all cultivable land may not be under cultivation. CCA is
divided into two parts (i) cultivated portion of CCA (ii) Cultivable but not
cultivated portion of CCA.
In the absence of detailed data, CCA may be assumed to be equal to 80% of GCA.

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Intensity of Irrigation:
The entire cultivated portion of the CCA is not proposed to be irrigated at one
time to avoid intensive irrigation of a particular area, which may cause harmful
effects like water logging, salinity and malaria. Besides, irrigation water not in
excessive amount.
So therefore some land is allowed to take rest or is sown with crops which do not
require irrigation water. These fields that are left irrigated in one season will be
supplied water in the next season and the first batch of land is left fallow then.
Thus fields are irrigated in rotation over different crop seasons viz. only 60% of
the cultivable area is brought under cultivation in a particular season.

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The percentage of CCA proposed to be irrigated in a given season is called the
intensity of irrigation of that season. eg. The intensity of irrigation of a given
canal system may be 27% for Kharif season and 34% for Rabi season.

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Area to be irrigated:
The area proposed to be irrigated in any one crop season or over any given year is called
the area to be irrigated in that season or year.
Area to be irrigated = CCA x seasonal or annual intensity of irrigation
The areas to be irrigated are usually worked out separately for each crop season, because
the water requirement of the crops of two seasons are quite different.
Time Factor:
To check the dangers of over irrigation leading to water logging and salinity, no
distributary is allowed to operate on all the days during any crop season.

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The ratio of the actual operating period of a distributary to the crop period is
called the time factor of the distributary.
For a given canal system, suppose the time factors of Kharif and Rabi seasons are
fixed at 0.80 and 0.72 respectively, which means each distributary would receive
its full supply for a period of 0.80 x 180 days = 144 days and 0.72 x 180 days = 129
days. As each crop season is of 180 days.
For computing the design capacity of a distributary, therefore, the computed
water requirement (for the crops proposed to be grown and irrigated by the
distributary) should be divided by the time factor.

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Capacity Factor:
The capacity factor for a canal is the ratio of the mean supply discharge in a canal
during a period to its designed full capacity. Since canals have to run almost to
their full designed capacities during Kharif (summer) season, this value usually
varies from 0.9 to 0.95 for Kharif season.
Since the water requirement during Rabi (winter) season reduces to about 2/3 rd
times the full supply, the capacity factor usually varies from 0.60 to 0.70 for Rabi
season.
To improve this factor during the Rabi season, the cropped area in Rabi season is
hence usually increased.

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Full Supply Coefficient:
Full supply coefficient is the design duty at the head of the canal. It means, the
number of hectares irrigable per cumec of the canal capacity at its head, is
known as the full supply coefficient of the canal.
Full Supply Coefficient = Area estimated to be irrigated during Base Period.
Design full supply discharge at the head of the canal

This factor is also called duty on capacity.

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Summer time canals

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Winter time canals

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The end

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