WASA: Hollis back to full operations today

WASA officials are assuring that the water is bacteriologically safe, and that the Hollis Water Treatment Plant, which was shut down, resulting in the loss of water, is expected to be fully operational by today.

WASA’s general manager, operations, Wayne Joseph, told Newsday yesterday that the plant was producing up to 7.5 million gallons of water per day, and by today it is expected that it would be operating at full capacity, producing eight million gallons of water daily.

Joseph said WASA’s crews worked continuously to clear the 13 landslides en route to the plant, as well as the five within the plant. He said the landslides occurred last week with the passage of Tropical Depression number 27, which dumped several inches of rain throughout the country. The full gushing rivers and the landslides brought down a significant amount of debris into the reservoir. Access to the plant, he said, was also hampered by fallen trees and a disruption to the TTEC power supply.

Joseph said they were forced to shut down the plant last Tuesday, causing communities from Arima to Arouca to be without a pipeborne water supply. He said WASA crews had to be flown to the plant by helicopters to assess the damage to the facility.

Acknowledging that the situation was extremely bad for WASA’s customers, Joseph stated that, in order to restart operations, additional work had to be done to ensure that only the top level waters of the reservoir would be distributed to customers.

He said those works were completed on Saturday, when water would have been restored to some customers.

Joseph said WASA was aware that the water supply was slightly discoloured, but the water was being treated with sufficient chlorine to make it "bacteriologically safe."

He pointed out that the murky conditions of the raw water are usually below five nephelometric turbidity units (NTU, the turbidity measurement), but the rains and landslides raised the level to 200 NTUs. He said the plant was designed for filtration only, and was unable to effectively treat the highly turbid water.

He said while work at the facility was underway, water supplies had been redirected where feasible from the Guanapo, Aripo, North Oropouche and Tacarigua systems in an attempt to service customers without a supply. A truck-borne water supply was also put into place using 18 trucks.

Joseph said 92 percent of the population currently has access to a pipeborne water supply, with only 18 percent receiving a continuous 24-seven supply of water directly to their homes.

Asked if WASA had plans to raise water rates anytime soon, Joseph acknowledged that WASA’s rates were extremely low. However, he said there were no plans, as far as he knew, to increase rates. He said for WASA to increase its rate, an application had to be made to the Regulated Industries Commission (RIC) and a consultative process undertaken.

He admitted with the degradation in the environment and the use of more chemicals to make the water supply safe, the cost of supplying water had doubled over the last five years.