Water Cuts – An overview from Dublin City Council
Lucinda recently contacted Dublin City Council again to complain about the lack of communication with local residents and businesses about what exactly is happening with the water supply, when they should expect cuts, and when they can expect normal service to resume. She also complained that certain areas are taking the brunt of the cuts in way which seems unfair and unequitable. She reseived the following response, which although lengthy, is worth reproducing in full, as it deals with Sandymount, Rathmines and other areas of Dublin South East as well as giving an overview of the situation.
Update on the Water Supply Situation February 5th 2010
At the City Council Meeting on 1st February 2010 it was agreed that a further report on the water supply situation would be issued. The situation since Monday night has been somewhat difficult. Due to the continuous high level of demand being placed on the Roundwood Water Treatment Plant and the necessity to carry out essential filter bed cleaning works there has been a reduction of 15 million litres per day in output from the plant. Coupled with this a rise in demand occurred when some restrictions were eased in order to improve levels of service to customers. As a consequence of these events storage levels at Stillorgan Reservoir fell in the early days of the week.
Production levels at Roundwood will be restored as soon as is possible but it has to be remembered that all water treatment plants have been operating at full capacity in order to try to meet demand and there is always the possibility of loss of production if routine maintenance cannot be carried out as has been the case over the last month.
A re-introduction of restrictions by each of the Dublin Region’s 6 Local Authorities has resulted in storage levels now beginning to rise again. Today we have 699 million litres in storage at Stillorgan Reservoir. In the absence of any further loss of treatment capacity and by maintaining the current level of restrictions until after this weekend (Monday Feb 8th) we should be in a position to begin the easing of restrictions from early next week. This would include a change in the night time restriction which will be altered to a 8PM to 6AM regime.
It will be necessary to continue to impose some level of restriction on supply for a considerable time to come. This will however be confined, as far as is possible, to times that will have the least impact on customers.
Leaks on watermains are being detected and repaired and this will continue to be the case. The detection of leaks will be helped by the rise in pressure that will occur as restrictions are eased.
We again apologise to those customers in the few areas still experiencing particular difficulties and assure them that every effort is being made to improve supply to them.
Larkfield: Alternative supply arrangements have been attempted but have proved ineffective. No restrictions were imposed on Thursday night (4th-5th Feb) and the duration of the weekend restrictions (7pm to 10am Fri to Sat and Sat to Sun) will be reduced in this area to (7pm to 7am Fri to Sat and Sat to Sun). Supplies will however be restricted from 7pm to 7am Sun to Mon. It is hoped, depending on progress over the weekend, that it will be possible to reduce the number of nights with restrictions from next week.
Sandymount: The most severely affected area has been transferred to an alternative supply and pressures in Sandymount have improved as a result. Further investigations are continuing to identify longer term solutions.
Kenilworth/Grosvenor/Leicester: Further investigations in the local area will continue over the weekend. An examination of the overall supply situation into the Terenure/ Rathgar/ Rathmines district is also being carried out. Leak location works have indicated a number of possible problems in this supply zone and these are being further investigated.
Craigford/St Brigids/ Killester: Flows into this have been increased and some improvement in pressures has been achieved. Further improvements in the general water supply situation will be necessary to allow this area to be restored to normal supply. It is hoped that the situation can be further improved on a gradual basis during next week. The possibility of longer term improvements, including main laying works in the area, are being investigated.
Unlike other utilities water distribution systems cannot be operated and managed so that exact supply areas and precise times at which the effects of pressure reductions or increases will be experienced by customers can be provided. Water does not travel instantly through the supply network and depending on layout and demand patterns it can take a considerable length of time for supplies to reach the extremities of supply areas. Care also has to be taken when altering systems as sudden changes in pressure will cause bursts in the old cast iron mains that are a feature of the city’s supply network. Some customers may, depending on where they are in a supply area, not receive supply for a time after a restriction has been lifted while also being the first to lose supply if a restriction is reimposed.
Unfortunately it is not possible to transfer the effects of supply restrictions evenly to all parts of a supply network such as Dublin City’s and it is unavoidable that some areas will be more often and more adversely affected than others when restrictions have to be imposed. Continuous efforts are being made to adjust supply arrangements in order to give relief to those in problem areas. Some of these efforts have been more successful than others. It will require a general increase in pressure to fully restore supply to some areas and this will only be achievable when treated water storage levels have been stabilised. Restrictions can be eased in a controlled manner that will not cause further system failure.
A further update will be provided next week.
Assistant City Manager.
