BWA ‘progresses sewage treatment plant upgrades’

The Garbage and Sewage Contribution (GSC) that Barbadians have been paying as part of their water bills for the past 18 months has been used to carry out much-needed repairs and upgrades to the Bridgetown and South Coast Sewage Treatment plants, a senior water utility official noted today.

Speaking during the Estimates debate, which this evening focused on the Ministry of Energy and Water Resources, Director of Engineering at the Barbados Water Authority, Charles Leslie, said: “Over the last couple of months we have been doing upgrades to the South Coast Sewage Plant.

“We replaced screens there, while in Bridgetown we replaced screens and are making upgrades in terms of replacing the blowers used in the treatment processes.

“The monies coming in from the GSC are being used to upgrade the treatment plants and maintain our waste water systems, and this is a continuous process.

“Wastewater treatment has been neglected owing to a lack of funding, so the money being used from the GSC is being used to bring the plants and networks up to a reasonable standard.”

Minister of Water Resources Wilfred Abrahams stressed that the Barbados Water Authority only used less than 17 per cent of the money collected by the levy.

While some people complained that they should not pay the levy if they did not live  where the plants were located, Dr Hugh Sealy of the BWA noted that ensuring the sewage systems were up to scratch was a matter of national interest.

He said: “When the south coast plant was being done they had thought of only having the people in that area pay for it, but at the end of the day, it is a matter of national interest because any problems with a sewage system will eventually affect our coral reefs, and that is one of our major economic assets.”

Dr Sealy also spoke of plans to move towards a tertiary level sewage treatment system in Barbados, but this would need some cultural buy-in from Barbadians to become fully accepted.

“This administration’s policy is to reuse every drop we can, so we have to upgrade the Bridgetown and south coast plants to tertiary treatment, that is we have the technology to take sewage to drinking water standards.

“The question is what is culturally and socially acceptable rather than what is technically possible and to look at the economic returns.

“The technology is available for us to go directly from toilet to tap, and to recharge the water aquifers, for example the Belle and Hampton wells with the aim os recovering this water for potable use.

“We can also use this water to irrigate crops, for example those that can be eaten without processing such as tomatoes, and those that are not edible like cotton, so the analysis has to be done.

“Presently we are producing four million gallons of waste water a day, and this method can go a long way in reducing our water deficit which is about seven million gallons a day.”

Dr Sealy also reported that the current categorisation of water tables in Barbados, which dates back to the early 1960s, would soon be upgraded to bring it in line with the country’s present and future needs.

He said: “The 1962 policy is no longer fit for purpose. It was supposed to protect the public supply wells from contamination from above ground sources, primarily housing, so we restricted development in Zone One areas, then we went from Zones Two to Five, with Five dealing mostly with coastal areas.

“We are now looking for a more integrated approach, which will protect the public supply as well as our coastlines.

“There may be a direct benefit to changing to the new system – and we have already prepared a paper on this –  because with the advances in technology we can still protect the public water supply and the net result should be a release of about four per cent of our land mass for development, moving from nine per cent currently listed as Zone One to 5 per cent, so this is an economic benefit.

“However, it does impose restrictions on houses that were not there before, for example you can no longer use only a suck well to dispose of water, there must also be a septic tank, and all housing developments of a particular density may be required to put in a treatment plant. So in some areas this new system will be more relaxed, while in others it will be more strict.”