Annual Report 2011.pdf (size 6 MB) - Offaly County Council

WATER SERVICES
Introduction
The delivery of Water services throughout the county
continues to be a challenge in terms of funding,
regulatory compliance and customer expectation of
service delivery. It will be increasingly difficult to fund
capital works required to maintain and upgrade our
infra-structure to meet the regulatory and service
requirements challenge of the next few years.
Notwithstanding resource limitations, drinking water
quality in both public and Group Water Schemes in
County is excellent, and service disruption is very rare.
The continuing reduction of the Water Services
operational budget, make it particularly challenging to
maintain and protect the investment in improved infrastructure
over the last few years. There is a risk that the
cost of repair and service interruption will outweigh the
savings achieved through reduced maintenance, in the
short to medium term.
Drinking Water
There were no boil water notices or drinking restrictions
served on Public Water Supplies in 2011. Offaly is one of
only 8 Water Services Authorities without any Water
Supply scheme on the EPA Remedial Action list.
Operational sampling increased at all WTP's in 2011 to
facilitate implementing tighter process control, which has
further improved water quality and helped reduce
chemical and power consumption.
Telemetry has been rolled out to all Water Supply
Schemes which facilitates alarming of, and response to,
water quality problems as required by the EPA. However,
the Council cannot maintain a continuous out of hours
response service to these alarms.
Network Management
Stages 1 & 2 0f the National Water Conservation Project
was completed in Offaly in 2010. All schemes are now
audited continuously and water leakage and wastage can
be detected and located at an early stage.
While the cold spells in 2010 and 2011, had a major
impact on Unaccounted for Water (UFW), the figure was
eventually restored to 46%; still short of the 44% level
Offaly Local Authorities Annual Report 2011
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