7 Year Business Plan

Irish Water: Amy A

Ervia has published a business plan for Irish Water up until 2021 that will bring Ireland’s national water infrastructure to an acceptable level after decades of underinvestment through a fragmented industry structure.

The business plan will deliver a quality service to our customers while addressing the fragmented service delivery that has had such a damaging effect on Ireland’s water infrastructure over many decades.
Delivery of the Irish Water Business Plan will bring about a €5.5bn investment in capital spending on drinking water quality and capacity, wastewater quality and capacity and new infrastructure up to 2021. The plan also sets out €1.1bn in operational efficiencies that will be achieved through reducing the cost of repairs and maintenance, payroll, energy, contracting and existing industry overheads.

By 2021 the business will reduce staff numbers by 1,500 from 2014 levels. It will deliver water services to customers in line with best utility practices, achieving significant efficiencies.

Speaking at a business stakeholders briefing Ervia’s Chief Executive Michael Mc Nicholas set out the national strategic approach: "Our water and wastewater services are not fit for purpose to meet the needs of a modern society and economy. Much of the infrastructure is old and poorly maintained. Half of our water never makes it to the tap, we discharge untreated sewage onto our beaches, nearly 1 million people’s water supply is at risk and we don’t have enough capacity for our capital to grow. The European Court of Justice is pursuing Ireland for multiple failures to address the discharge of raw sewage into our environment. This cannot continue."

"Having a single national utility is the only way to deliver the essential investment and transformation required between now and 2021. A utility model for water services has long been the norm across Europe, and is the norm in Ireland for other essential services such as electricity and gas.” said Mr Mc Nicholas.
Since we were established, we have made considerable progress towards achieving our 2021 targets including:

· Removed 20,000 people from Boil Water Notices
· Increased the headroom (spare water capacity) for Dublin from 2% to 8%
· Built nine new drinking water treatment plants and upgraded 18
· Provided new/upgraded waste treatment plants in Clonakilty, Carrigtwohill, Clifden, Leixlip, Galway
· Introduced a First Fix Programme to tackle 70,000 customer leaks. We have already saved 18 million litres and have a target 46 million litres of water per day
· Built 250 km of new mains and replaced a similar length of existing mains 438 to save 32 million litres of water every day
· Developed a National Lead Strategy for the first time
· Started work on the €91m Cork Lower Harbour Project
· Produced an Integrated €73m plan for 8 major schemes in Donegal to resolve long-standing deficiencies in supplies, serving 90,000 people

By 2021 the Irish Water Business Plan commits to:

· Eliminating the risk of drinking water contamination for 940,000 people
· Lifting all current boil water notices
· Reducing leakage from 49% to 38% - saving 180 million litres every day
· Implementing a national lead strategy to reduce risk of contamination in up to 140,000 homes and an additional 40,000 homes on shared services
· Ending the discharge of untreated wastewater at 44 locations
· Significantly increasing water and wastewater capacity to support social and economic development.

John Tierney Managing Director of Irish Water said, “We are determined to deliver on these ambitious targets in order to provide our customers with the modern water and wastewater services that Ireland needs. We are transforming the delivery model for water services and at the same time we are bringing about the much needed improvement in infrastructure. We will be giving customers better service, delivered more efficiently, no matter where they live in Ireland.”

Michael Mc Nicholas said: “The provision of clean drinking water and the disposal of wastewater in a way that protects the environment is vital to our daily lives and for Ireland’s social and economic development. All major industries rely on an available supply of clean water and on the capacity to treat waste water to required environmental standards. As a country with abundant clean water resources this should be a source of strategic advantage to our country. The Irish Water Business Plan represents the first phase of investment and change to make this advantage a sustainable one for future generations.”

galwayfellaBETA

Pffh: You missed the bit about the Irish peoples water supply being owned by some billionaire and the cost of water going through the roof!

TallGlass

Just wondering. Why are you guys only aiming to reduce leaks by less than 10% by 2021. To me getting this to under 10% would be my number one target towards 2021, 38% is a serious amount of water wastage. That's still nearly half of all water output is wasted, surely thats also alot of money wasted?

Irish Water: Niall

Hi TallGlass,

Thank you for contacting us.

TallGlass wrote: »

Just wondering. Why are you guys only aiming to reduce leaks by less than 10% by 2021. To me getting this to under 10% would be my number one target towards 2021, 38% is a serious amount of water wastage. That's still nearly half of all water output is wasted, surely thats also alot of money wasted?

Leakage is an immediate priority for Irish Water. Irish Water currently estimates that, nationally, 49% of water produced is lost to leakage from the distribution network and in customer properties. This is unacceptable and reducing this level of leakage is a priority. The metering of domestic and commercial properties will aid the detection of leaks.

However, it is never possible to reduce water leakage to zero. Experience from the UK indicates that an economic level of leakage is in the region of 18-22% of water treated. Irish Water's 25 year strategy, the Water Services Strategic Plan (WSSP) aims to reduce the current leakage rate of approximately 49% to less than 38% by the end of 2021, to 30% by 2027 and to an economic level of leakage by 2040. The WSSP is the first time that a 25 year vision for water services has been developed in Ireland. The WSSP is supported by the recently published Irish Water Business Plan which sets out the initial implementation phase up to 2021. This includes a 5.5 billion investment across drinking water quality and capacity, wastewater quality and capacity and new infrastructure up to 2021.

I hope this information helps. Please feel free to contact us with any other queries you may have.

Kind regards,
Niall

TallGlass

Hi Niall, thanks for the reply. 

I am still a little unclear from the answer ! Can we not speed this up a little? 25 years is still a hell of a long time and to only drop 19% seems madness, considering the point of IW I thought was to conserve water. We are acknowledging a serious issue here with conservation that nearly half of our water is wasted. Seems to me that we are defeating the purpose of metering/charging if we are not going to tackle leaking and take it seriously sooner rather than later. 

What percentage of water is lost before it hits the house/commercial premises? Why can't we do what Bord Gas done some years ago and replaced all the gas lines up into the home.

Another question I have is if our level of leakage in clean water pipes is 49%, what is our level of leakage in sewerage pipes?

I'm having a hard time believing that IW is nothing more than a hidden tax/commercial venture, with a rookie agenda of making things better, if you had of said we are going to replace every single water pipe and bring leakage down to 10% in the next 15 years that sounds more like you are out to solve a problem. 

Cheers.