mip patron tun dr mahathir mohamad honoured - Malaysian Institute ...

Water, Water Everywhere, I Turn My Tap but It’s Not There
By Ishak Ariffin
We live in the tropical zone, with 12 hours of sunshine all year
round. We get plenty of rain all year round too, some months a
lot more than others. Only the northwest corner of the Peninsula
gets a distinct dry period from January to March. This is the area
that lies to the west of an imaginary line between Songkhla and
Sungai Petani, that ecologists called the Kedawi region. Now
that has changed too, with the erratic weather pattern that we
have been experiencing in recent years.
I remember the grass in my home state up there in laksa land
(Kedah, of course!) used to turn yellowish brown in January and
remained that way until late March. Semi-deciduous trees shed
their leaves like in the autumn in temperate countries (maybe it
is the trees’ strategy to reduce water loss). That was when the
bare dedap trees sprout flowers in deep red amongst its leafless
branches, and the kapok (kekabu) seeds cracked to show off
their white fluffy fibres that we used for stuffing pillows and
mattresses in the old days. The drains in big towns such as Alor Star
were stagnant, helping to retain some humidity, although they
smell unpleasant. When it coincided with the padi harvesting,
you can catch the most glorious sunsets in the evenings. It was
hot and dry at that time of year. Then everything came back to
life in glorious green when the rain returns in April. This year we
have had thunderstorms in late January and February.
Water is Life
But we were never really short of water.
That is no longer true. Despite having an estimated 990 billion
m3 (2008 figures) of rainfall annually, and 566 billion m3 of that
total flowing into our rivers,and our water usage being roughly
only 3% of the latter, we are running short of water supply.
Domestic and industrial water demand is only about 6,000
million m3 a year!
Initially, it was the rapid growth of industrial estates that
brought shortages of water in their neighbouring towns. Then
came the rapid urbanisation, all along the west coast of the
Peninsula. Factories that used to be way out of town suddenly
found themselves surrounded by housing estates. Many places
begin to experience frequent water supply disruption.I’ll bet
not many people remember the drought in 1998 that brought
hardship on some 1.8m Klang Valley residents due to water
rationing.
But we still have plenty of rain and flowing rivers, except that
our most of our rivers now looked like a perpetual supply of
tehtarik. Our water treatment plants had to work overtime to
make the water potable or clean enough for our consumption.
And we are running short of rivers that can provide clean water
to the treatment plants as development encroaches further and
further upstream and inland.
8
97% of our 6,000 million m 3 per year potable water supply comes
from rivers and the balance is from ground water. In contrast,
a country like Denmark consumed almost 1,000 million m3
per year, and it is entirely sourced from groundwater. Their
groundwater resource is estimated to be only 1,800 million m³
per year.
Sg Selangor Dam
In Perlis we had to inundate 5% of the land area to create the
Timah-Tasoh impoundment to provide water for irrigation and
for domestic consumption. Perlis was totally dependent on
groundwater and water supply from Kedah. However, it was then
found that the demand for domestic & industrial uses exhausted
the original design capacity of the dam. In Selangor, a water
treatment plant downstream of Sungai Bernam had to be closed
due to saline intrusion. This was due the reduced river flow that
resulted in sea water flowing in further inland up to the water
intake points. One of the things that affect water level in the
river is the increasing water extraction upstream. Loss of water
catchment areas due to opening of forested areas for other uses
also affected river flow.
Fifteen years or so ago an area near Balakong in Cheras, near
a water treatment plant suffered water supply disruption but
it was raining a lot and the houses around it were suffering
from flash floods. How could we have water shortage and flood
at the same time?In 1991 another state suffered water supply
shortage for a number of years because the main water supply
dam was contaminated by industrial effluent. Now we have
found that several states in the Peninsula are running short
of water come 2020. We have resorted to expensive remedial
actions that include building more dams and water transfers
between neighbouring states through tunnels punched through
our mountains and hills.
In the meantime, we remain complacent about our per capita
water consumption. We continue to waste our water as if the
supply is endless. The national average consumption was 210
“Too much water” - When the river overflows
NEWSLETTER OF THE MALAYSIAN INSTITUTE OF PLANNERS