‘Strategise to protect water catchment areas’
KUALA LUMPUR: Water authorities must strategise and implement measures to protect water catchment areas to prevent water supply disruptions in the future.
Water quality and modelling specialist Dr Zaki Zainudin said this while commenting on the ongoing water cuts caused by odour pollution in Sungai Selangor.
“This is an unscheduled disruption caused by pollution. The question is: why does this keep happening and what can we do about it? We have to be honest about the cause of the pollution.
“The fact of the matter is, any type of development, commercial or industrial, will generate pollution. That’s just how the cookie crumbles. We should not downplay pollution generated by development activities,” he told the New Straits Times.
Zaki said many such developments in Selangor were located upstream of water intake plants, hence, the pollution risk was present due to the rapid development and pollutants flowing downstream.
He said as water catchment areas were not protected, they were susceptible to development and the pollution that came along with it.
“So Selangor (and other states) really have to start strategising to protect water catchment areas while at the same time trying to develop the state. It’s difficult.
“As water resource is under the purview of the states, the respective states have to play a leading role despite the fact that pollution (at the moment) is mostly regulated by the Environment Department, which is a federal agency.
“Lembaga Urus Air Selangor (Luas) as a state water regulator is much ahead compared with other such agencies in Malaysia. Fortunately or unfortunately, Selangor is also one of, if not the most developed state in Malaysia, so Luas faces many challenges.”
The basin of a river stretches from upstream to downstream and it is the norm to build the water treatment plants (WTP) downstream due to the higher quantity of water available there.
Zaki had, earlier in February, said that to guarantee water security, the authorities should gazette water catchment areas as protected zones to prevent activities that could harm rivers.
He had also called for the implementation of a more efficient water treatment system that allows contaminated water to be treated directly without having to
shut down the WTP.
Zaki noted that to overcome the problem, a plethora of strategies or measures needed to deployed.
It is not a “one size fits all solution”, but rather a combination of effective and sustainable policies, effective implementation and good governance as well as
technology solutions, he added.
“There are many pollution sources upstream of water intakes. This factory (in Rawang) is not the only one.
“Sure, punitive measures are needed, but effective planning and implementation are more vital.”