Water supply is 28 million litres adaytoolowas crisis continues
DEMAND for water across the Greater Dublin Area (GDA) is outstripping supply by 28 million litres a day, the equivalent daily consumption of Cork city.
Irish Water has warned that pressure will be reduced across the capital and parts of Wicklow, Meath, and Kildare for the foreseeable future until reservoir levels rise to cater for demand.
As clean-up operations in the wake of Storm Emma continue, local authorities are still struggling to free some householders in isolated areas across Wexford, Kildare, Wicklow, Tipperary and Galway.
But John Mulholland, the local government representative on the National Emergency Co-ordination Group, said help was on the way. However, he warned it would take time for normal life to resume.
“What I want to say to those communities is that help is on hand. You will be reached,” he said. “The situation will be restored to as normal as it can be in the short term.”
Crisis management teams in 15 out of 31 local authorities have now been stood down, but the water network remains a serious concern.
Thousands remain without water or subject to restrictions, with 1.2 million people across the Greater Dublin Area hit with night-time pressure reductions which will result in cut-offs in some areas.
Irish Water managing director Jerry Grant said he was aware of the “enormous social impact” the shortages were having, adding that some people had been left without water for up to five days.
The situation in the capital was critical, with 111 million litres of back-up supply lost since Friday.
As a result, engineers had to adopt a “crude mechanism” of controlling water usage by closing valves, which is taking place at night between 8pm and 6am. This has led to some households losing all their water supply, while others suffered minimal impact.
The 48 reservoirs across the Greater Dublin Area are supposed to hold 884 million litres in reserve, as a backstop to compensate for mains bursts and plant failures. Some 754 million litres were in storage yesterday afternoon.
Speaking at the utility’s National Operations Management Centre in Dublin, spokesman John Keane said that the Rathmichael reservoir in Dún Laoghaire was designed to hold nine million litres, but currently held just four million. Flemington, in Fingal, had two million, three million litres less than needed, while Ballycoolin should have 154 million litres but had just 121.4 million.
The operations centre monitors treatment plants, pumping stations, reservoir levels and other equipment across the GDA, which produce 580 million litres of water a day, around 20 million litres more than is usually required. On Monday, there was demand for 608 million litres.
More than a dozen leaks were found yesterday which were wasting 100,000 litres of water or more each.
Outside of Dublin, just over 23,000 people have no supply in Galway, Leitrim, Tipperary and Wexford. They include 12,000 people who will be without supply for at least 10 days after a major issue arose at Fethard, in Tipperary, after kerosene spilled into a local waterway and got “sucked up by the pumps” at a water treatment plant. Mr Grant said a “major remediation job” was needed, adding it was a “very serious incident”. Another 39,000 have restricted supply due to low levels in reservoirs across Leitrim, Cork, Galway, Kerry, Kildare, Mayo and Meath.
Restrictions across the GDA will be staggered across days, and the utility hopes to “refine restrictions” so that areas are not hit with low pressure on consecutive days. Met Éireann has predicted no weather extremes in the days ahead, although temperatures will be below average.
More than a dozen leaks were found yesterday which were wasting 100,000 litres of water or more each