Government outlines plan for improved water supply

The issue of supplying water to the country continues to be a fight that the Gaston Browne-led administration is undergoing.

Efforts are being made to ensure that an adequate supply is produced daily.

Cabinet this week outlined several different steps they are taking.

One is the disassembling of the old Tango plant and construction of a new one in its place.

“It takes up space, but it doesn’t provide any service at the moment and so what we’re doing is removing it so at some point we can place another plant where it now sits. It’s really no more than un-used metal and so, it is being disassembled to make way for a new Reverse Osmosis Plant so that our productive level can climb.

“We need about 12 million gallons of water daily and we’re only at 8 million at the moment,” Hurst explained.

Additionally, the Ffryes Beach Reverse Osmosis Plant which was commissioned back in 2011 will begin providing potable water next Friday.

All the work necessary to expand the plant and to connect the supply lines have been completed.

The pumps will be activated on Tuesday.

One will pump the water in a northerly direction as far as St. John’s; the other will pump in a southerly direction to meet demands in Johnson’s Point, Cades Bay, Old Road, and other communities in the South.

Reverse osmosis plants remove the salt from seawater by pushing the water through semi-permeable membranes.

Previously, APUA’s Water Business Unit operated six reverse osmosis plants – one on Barbuda and five on mainland Antigua.

The Antigua-based plants are Crabbs, which produces 3.1 million gallons a day; Ivan Rodrigues, 1.6 million; Camp Blizzard, 600,000 gallons; Pigeon Point, 330,000 gallons; and Ffryes presently 600,000 gallons.

The addition of the Fort James plant took that number to seven.

There were plans to construct another plant in Bethesda but late last year APUA announced they would be cancelling those plans.

According to General Manager John Bradshaw, the authority will instead focus on constructing the new facility at Crabbes Peninsula, which will replace an existing, aging plant that has been in operation for decades.

The Crabbes plant was commissioned in 1988 by Enerserv.