By VANESSA C ROLLE,Guardian Staff Reporter
The Water and Sewerage Corporation has a developed a strategy to reduce 'non-revenue' water, which is presently at 50 percent, Minister of Works and Utilities Bradley Roberts told Rotarians on Thursday.
Speaking on the topic The Water Crisis and Its Impact on the Ongoing Development of New Providence, Minister Roberts announced that the Corporation is presently implementing various components to combat the problems it causes .
He further noted that some 60 percent of homeowners in New Providence have private wells and do not purchase water from the Corporation. These people have not experienced the problems incurred by the utility company over the past seven months after Hurricane Frances. "I am advised that this hurricane, without a direct hit on Andros, nevertheless, resulted in seawater inundating the well field as a result of a tidal surge. To date, although significantly quality improvements have been made through quick corrective measures taken by the Corporation, previous levels have not been fully re-established."
In 2003 he said, the Corporation sought to proactively address the issue by becoming a more reliable service through the provision of redundancy, the ability to survive catastrophic weather events, and proximity to consumers. Hence, a 10-year water supply strategy for New Providence has been developed. According to Mr Roberts, the strategy focuses on the elimination of "often-unreliable" importation of water, the elimination of low quality sources, storage increases, and stand-by power generation, merging of production/demand centers, and the provision of excess production capacity.
Stating that Prime Perry Christie challenged the W&S Corp. to bring the quality and consistency of water to acceptable levels, he acknowledged that it is the government's responsibility to put forward the policies to achieve this aim.
"There is no doubt that the recent crisis had a profound effect not only on residents but also on businesses, schools, and other consumers. Several commercial enterprises had, for short periods, to close their facilities due to a lack of water and some schools, particularly those without on-site storage, similarly had to close again for short periods. Additionally, old and new consumers alike had to seek alternative supplies. All this underscores the fact that the Corporation's effectiveness in bringing water to the nation is of paramount importance. Hence, the Corporation is always renewing its commitment to provide and sustain consistent quality water supplies in adequate quantities to the public."
Mr Roberts also noted that the recent crisis raised pertinent health concerns arising from the lack of availability of treated water for simple activities such as the washing of hands. It also had an impact on tourists during their stay in the hotels or visits to commercial establishments.
"While there is no indication that any long-lasting or permanent damage has been realised, the government and the Corporation have moved forward with strategic plans to avoid a repeat of this potentially deleterious situation."
Such factors, including costs, he added, led the Corporation to focus on the use of desalinated seawater water, through reverse osmosis. The present ratio between groundwater sources and reverse osmosis or RO is 79% to 21%, whereas the strategic plan calls for a 7% to 93% ratio by 2013.
"I am advised that together these initiatives will minimise the possibility that the recent crisis will occur again," Mr Roberts stated. "I am also advised that based on its demand projections the Corporation does not anticipate the need to raise water tariffs over the next 10 years. I am advised that this will, of course, be dependent on the Corporation expanding its customer base in New Providence as it presently serves less than 50% of residents and hotels.
"My Government fully supports the initiatives and strategic plans developed by the Corporation as evidenced by the award of contract for the Blue Hills RO plant and the instruction to proceed with procurement of the Arawak Cay RO plant. The Corporation has confidently stated that successful implementation will result in the elimination of such crises in the future, and ensure that water will not be a deterrent to the ongoing development of New Providence."
The proposed 10-year strategy may be summarised as follows:
* Dependence on desalinated water which satisfies sustainability and quality concerns.
* Strategic deployment of plants in demand centers such as the west (existing Windsor plant), central (recently awarded Blue Hills plant), downtown Arawak Cay plant, and east (Winton area plant). This deployment provides redundancy and reduces operations and infrastructure costs, as well as water losses. Presently, the Corporation must produce about 15MG of potable water a day in order to experience a supply of 9MG. This translates into high electricity cost and water losses through transmission mains. By merging demand and production, existing infrastructure will not have to be upgraded to accommodate higher volumes being transmitted.
* Continuation of Build-Own Operate model to reduce high capital expenditure for RO plants. The supplier finances, builds, operates and maintains the facility, while the Corporation guarantees to purchase an agreed weekly volume.
* Inclusion of more than 20 percent excess production capacity to minimise production shortfalls and allow increased production when demand warrants.
* Plants constructed to Bahamian Building Code, thus providing confidence in withstanding hurricane damage.
* Storage facilities provided with each plant. The volume of storage is dependent on the plant size.
* Stand-by power facilities attached to each plant. The aim is to not necessarily maintain 100 percent capacity but to ensure that prolonged power failures do not fully interrupt production.
