Ahead of a planned March 1 Northern system shutdown to repair pipeline leaks, the Water and Sewerage Company Inc. (WASCO) has announced that the government would assist with trucking water to consumers.
“They will assist us with that trucking, for which we are very grateful,” WASCO Chief Executive Officer Zilta George-Leslie said at a news conference on Tuesday.
She explained that trucking water to customers, which WASCO has been doing for the past three weeks, is very costly.
However, she said the government was willing to partner with WASCO in paying truckers to provide the service.
The WASCO CEO disclosed that trucking water would continue until February 29.
But she said on March 1 and 2, no trucking will occur because of the temporary system shutdown.
Nevertheless, she told reporters that in the case of an emergency, WASCO has a backup.
“We have the Hill 20 system, which is not attached to this John Compton Dam system,” George-Leslie stated.
She also said WASCO has its Thomazo system in Dennery.
The WASCO CEO said in the event of an emergency, truckers could collect water from those two facilities.
George-Leslie observed that people can request trucking currently.
“We have now established those zone officers so each officer now we would be able to give out that number, and we will share that with you as well as with the public so that they can know persons in a particular area and the particular person that you can reach so we want to make it a little more personable and a lot more easier for the customers,” she told reporters.
Nevertheless, the WASCO officials advised citizens to conserve water,
She also reminded Saint Lucians that from January to June constitutes the dry season.
In this regard, she asserted that based on global forecasts about El Nino and climate change, the dry season would be ‘very rigourous’, bringing low flows.
“We are already experiencing and seeing low flows in certain areas in the South and also in certain areas in the North, so people need to be mindful,” George-Leslie declared.
While urging people to conserve water, she acknowledged customer complaints that they could not do so when they were not receiving supplies.
George-Leslie told the news conference it was for that reason that WASCO had implemented water trucking.
