By October of this year, the Ffryes Beach Reverse Osmosis plant will be producing more water.

Public Utilities Minister Melford Nicholas said the process was delayed due to developmental plans for lands adjacent to the plant.

The Antigua Public Utilities Authority would need to acquire a bit of land adjacent to the facilities and plant at Ffryes. On all accounts, that process is now complete.

“I believe the foundation footprints have already been demarcated and they will be moving towards building the concrete slab. The timeline has slipped a little bit. We would have expected the plant to be almost ready for service by the end of September”.

“I think based on the delays that were caused by the acquisition and preparation of that land that we’re looking now more at October,” Nicholas said.

He revealed that the Seven Seas Water Group agreement will become operational once the proprietary work is completed at that site.

“Why we got into an engagement with Seven Seas was for rapid deployment and most of the plants can be deployed because most of it is containerized. So once the demarcation on that plinth is built the plants are ready to be shipped already there in St. Martin”.

Plans for a booster station in the Cades Bay area are also progressing and will bring relief to residents in that area.

“There is another project that is pending implementation and that is a booster station in the Cades Bay area that will allow us to consistently get water over the hillside in to ensure that not only the hotel in that area but all of the residents in that area can have a frequent flow of water and the pumps already acquired and it’s just for the construction of the particular booster station,” Minister Nicholas said.