An Indian engineer is making artificial glaciers to cope with climate problems.


Water managers interested in innovative, inexpensive solutions to water supply problems may want to consider a research trek in the Himalayan foothills of northern India.

Chewang Norphel, a civil engineer known locally as the Glacier Man, has been building artificial glaciers to supply irrigation water for the villages of the Ladakh region for the last 15 years, InfoChange India reports.

Norphel constructs the glaciers by redirecting autumn and winter melt to shady valleys above the fields. Stone embankments create small pools, which freeze and slowly accumulate mass. Thin metal pipes with punched holes also act as ice-makers – water enters the pipes, freezes and is then pushed out of the holes.

"The villagers can understand this," Norphel told InfoChange India. "This is optimum utilization of water by using the simplest technique, at a low cost. It also helps recharge groundwater and nearby springs."

The largest glacier Norphel built is 1,000 feet long, 150 feet wide and four feet deep, according to InfoChange India. It supplies irrigation water to a village of 700 people at one-tenth the cost of constructing a water reservoir.

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