Madam, – I must take issue with the letter of Joc Sanders CEng (January 5th) which is incorrect in a number of respects.
The Water Supply Strategy for the Dublin Region involves parallel investment in water storage and treatment, leakage reduction, network rehabilitation and new source development and demand management. Since 1996 this regional strategy is being implemented to address decades of underinvestment. The water supply situation in the Dublin region is very complex and is not amenable to quick fix or single approach solutions.
First, he says that there is plenty of raw water in Dublin region reservoirs at present. In fact, current abstractions from the Liffey and Vartry rivers, which supply over 95 per cent of Dublin’s raw water, are close to their sustainable limits and cannot meet future needs. Indeed, climate change projections suggest that future rainfall in the region could reduce significantly with consequences for existing reservoirs.
As regards leakage levels, the Dublin Region Water Conservation project reduced leakage from 42.5 per cent to 28 per cent and confirmed that reductions below this would require replacement of significant portions of our ancient Victorian network. Britain has a very similar water distribution network to ours and it has taken high levels of sustained investment for over 25 years to approach leakage levels of 20 per cent there. In addition, Ireland generally (including the Dublin Region) has significant leakage on the customer side of the property boundary which will take many years to bring under control to best practice standards. Investment in replacing these mains has been commenced through the Dublin Region Watermain Rehabilitation Project. Over 60km of mains have already been replaced and an additional 200km will be replaced over the next two years.
The plans and teams are in place and the local authorities have the ability to accelerate this replacement programme depending on funding. I greatly welcome the support of Minister for the Environment John Gormley and the Government in committing finance to this project.
In planning for the long-term (2020-2050) future water supply needs of the Dublin and Mid East Regions, the scheme (at the planning stage) for usage of Shannon water, via intermediate raw water cutaway bog storage at a new midlands water based eco park, is only one element in an overall approach which envisages significant additional investments (€400million) to reduce leakage to best practice levels of 20 per cent (a massive challenge), combined with the implementation of full domestic metering and charging to reduce personal consumption and domestic household leakage. Only by combining all of these measures can we hope to have a “first world” water supply in the future.
Mr Sanders also states incorrectly that future water demand estimates for the Dublin (and Mid East) Regions were based on Celtic Tiger era projections for population and economic growth.
Population of the GDA in 1960 was 0.9 million. In 2010 it is in excess of 1.5 million and is forecast by the CSO to exceed two million minimum within the next 20-30 years.
The underlying one per cent to two per cent annual increase in GDA population, which has been ongoing for more than 50 years forms the basis of future demand estimates, not the Celtic Tiger rates. Population projections are based on the Greater Dublin Area (GDA) Regional Planning Guidelines for 2010-2022 and on National Spatial Strategy/CSO projections for the post-2022 period. Long-term water supply planning is based on these population projections combined with a resumption in economic growth which can be greatly enhanced by ensuring secure sustainable provision of treated water supplies for industry and foreign direct investment wishing to locate in the Dublin, mid east or Midlands regions to create jobs.
In planning for the future, it is vital that we continue investment in replacing old assets and recognise the value of a continuous water supply.
For Dublin and the Midlands to have good capacity of quality water available would make Ireland one of the most attractive locations in the world for important industries and support job creation. It is a project that benefits not just Dublin but the national economy and is a project of national importance.
In the meantime, it is worth acknowledging that frontline water services personnel have been heroic over the holiday period in maintaining water supplies under the most difficult conditions and in spite of the legacy of under-investment for decades, which is now being addressed. – Yours, etc,