Water Quality Report Published

05 July 2010 8:41

Northern Ireland Water (NI Water) today published its Drinking Water Quality Report for 2009. This is the sixth annual quality report under the current regulations.

Introducing the report, NI Water’s Director of Asset Management, George Butler said:

“The report being published today represents a close collaboration between NI Water, its Regulators and the Health Authorities. During 2009 NI Water carried out more than 235,000 tests on the water supplies to check and assure the water quality.

“The 2009 report shows that our ongoing investments in water treatment, storage and watermains have led to the delivery of the best ever drinking water quality to our customers. Our Mean Zonal Compliance, measured at customers’ taps, has improved from 99.49% in 2008 to 99.74% in 2009.

“The increase in compliance this year is largely due to the targeted capital investment to upgrade five major water treatment works under the £110 million Public Private Partnership (PPP) Project, called PPP Alpha. This has contributed to the significant improvement in Total Trihalomethanes (THMs) compliance from 86.43% in 2008 to 96.39% in 2009.”

Mr Butler emphasised that NI Water’s ongoing capital investment programme has delivered improvements in service and quality for customers:

“Whilst we continue to make progress, we are also aware that further challenges lie ahead and that investment must continue in order to maintain this high standard and address the few remaining areas of non-compliance.”

NI Water will continue to work closely with economic and environmental regulators, the Consumer Council and other stakeholders throughout our PC10 (Strategic Business Plan) period of investment from 2010-2013.