Every location in the State with a population of over 1,000 will have its own waste-water treatment plant by the time a new €5.4 billion scheme is completed, the Minister for the Environment announced yesterday.
Mr Cullen claimed that the scheme would change people's lives.
The Water Services Invest-
ment Programme over the period 2003 to 2005 comprised 737 schemes at different stages of development. "With a total investment of €5.4 billion, the programme is the most significant milestone yet in the push to bring our water services infrastructure up to a world standard," the Minister said.
The scheme was the third phase in a series of three-year investment plans begun in 2000 to accelerate the upgrading of the national water and waste-water infrastructure.
An EU directive required particular levels of waste-water treatment to be installed by December 2005 for discharges from a graduated range of population thresholds, ultimately down to as low as 2,000.
"I can confirm that we are going further than the requirements of the directive," Mr Cullen said.
Between schemes already put in place since the beginning of the NDP in 2000 and those announced yesterday, every location in the country with a population greater than 1,000 would have its own waste-water treatment plant, he said. This was one of the most advanced schemes in Europe.
"By any measure that is a remarkable turnaround from what prevailed up to relatively recently, when some of our major cities and towns were discharging waste water with little or, in some cases, no treatment.
"It is fair to say that the funds being invested in water services under the NDP are completely transforming the situation throughout the country," the Minister said.
The Ringsend Treatment Plant in Dublin was one of the biggest waste-water treatment plans in the EU, the Minister said. There would also be treatment facilities in place and operational this year in Cork, Limerick, Galway and Wexford.
The Green Party leader, Mr Trevor Sargent TD, accused the Minister of encouraging more water consumption rather than conservation of a finite and essential resource.
"The Minister's euphoria for old end-of-pipe plans unfortunately overlooks the chronic need for effective water conservation measures which would also make for more efficient use of taxpayers' money," he said.