Drainage is Mathematics

Dec 31, 2025 Features / Columnists, Peeping Tom

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(Kaieteur News) – Flooding in Guyana is often discussed in emotional terms. People are angry. People are frustrated. People want quick fixes.

But drainage does not respond to anger. It responds to numbers. That is the uncomfortable truth.

This is not a new idea. In 2016, the Dutch Risk Reduction Team came to Guyana. They told the authorities something very simple. Drainage problems cannot be solved without data. They cannot be solved without proper mapping. They cannot be solved without mathematical models. In short, they said drainage is mathematics.

Without knowing how much water falls, where it flows, how fast it moves, and how much can be removed, there can be no real progress in addressing flooding. Policy without numbers is guesswork. And guesswork is what floods homes and farms.

This failure was exposed again during the recent overnight floods in Black Bush Polder. Let us look at the numbers. Not politics. Not press releases. Just the math.

Black Bush Polder covers roughly 242 square miles. That is a massive area. Now assume one inch of rainfall falls overnight. This is not an extreme assumption. It happens often during the rainy season.

One inch of rain over that area produces more than four billion gallons of water. That water does not disappear. It must go somewhere. The pumping station being built for Black Bush Polder has a discharge capacity of about 252,000 gallons per minute.
That sounds impressive. Until you do the math.

At that rate, removing one inch of rainfall from 242 square miles takes close to 14 days. That is fourteen days of continuous pumping. No breakdowns. No power failures. No high tides. And no additional rain.

Anyone who lives in Guyana knows that last condition is impossible. It almost always rains again before the water is gone. So, the system never catches up.

Now consider the Adventure Pump Station. It reportedly has a capacity of about 126,000 gallons per minute. Less than half of the Black Bush Polder pump that is supposed to be under construction. More importantly, it only marginally drains Black Bush Polder. Its drainage area stretches from to Number 43. That is a different hydraulic system. Any effect it has on Black Bush Polder flooding is marginal at best.

Yet the public is encouraged to feel reassured. To believe that these pumps are the solution. To trust that the problem is being handled. But feelings do not drain water.

There is another hard truth. Black Bush Polder is deep. Not in miles. The canals are unending. Water has to travel long distances through canals before it reaches a pump or a koker. That takes time. Even with perfect maintenance, it takes time.

If floodwaters are coming from an overtopping Canje Creek, the problem becomes even more severe. In that case, water is entering the system faster than it can be removed. No pump can provide short-term relief under those conditions.

This is not opinion. This is physics.

So, when authorities say that a G$446 million pump at Adventure and a nearly G$800 million pump in Black Bush Polder will solve flooding, one simple question must be asked. Show us the math. Show us the drainage model. Show us the rainfall assumptions. Show us the storage capacity of canals. Show us the pumping curves. Show us how long it takes to drain one inch, two inches, or four inches of rain.

Without this information, the public is being asked to trust without evidence. That is not engineering. That is hope. Hope is not a drainage strategy.

The Dutch were clear in 2016. Map the system. Measure the system. Model the system. Then plan. Then build.

Guyana has invested billions of dollars in drainage infrastructure. That investment deserves greater transparency. It deserves mathematics.

Drainage alone will never solve flooding in Guyana. It cannot. The volumes of water that fall during heavy rainfall events are simply too large to be removed quickly by pumps and kokers, no matter how expensive or modern they are. Pumps work at fixed rates, while rain can fall in minutes and hours. When rainfall exceeds drainage capacity, water must be held somewhere.

That is where storage becomes essential. Conservancies, retention basins, flood plains, and properly designed canals act as buffers, holding excess water until it can be released safely. Without storage, every inch of rain becomes an emergency, every pump becomes overwhelmed, and every system falls behind. Real flood control is therefore not drainage or storage. It is drainage and storage working together, planned, sized, and managed using sound mathematics.

Flooding will not be solved by press conferences. It will not be solved by ribbon cuttings. It will not be solved by telling people to feel reassured.  Flooding will not be solved by dispatching excavators to exploder farmlands or engage in last-minute clearing of canals.

It will only be solved when decisions are driven by data. By maps. By models. And by numbers that can withstand scrutiny. Until then, every heavy rainfall will tell the same story. And the water will keep reminding us.

(The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of this newspaper.)

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• drainage, flooding, mathematics, Peeping Tom

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