Utilities Minister, Melford Nicholas, is giving a personal undertaking to the residents of Antigua; major improvements in the availability of water will come by the end of the year.
Minister Nicholas gave the commitment while delivering the feature address on Saturday at the commissioning exercise at Little Ffryes where the American company, Seven Seas, has installed a reverse osmosis plant that is already producing an average of 1-million gallons of water per day. Much of this water is already making a marked difference in homes and businesses in the southern corridor of Antigua.
“By the end of this year, I anticipate that the capacity of APUA, with its partners, to produce enough water to supply one hundred percent of Antigua with a regular supply of water at their demand. That’s what my internal goal (for the supply of water) is,” he told the audience at commissioning ceremony.
The minister pointed out that while the coming on stream of the Seven Seas Plant was a significant milestone, it was certainly not the end-game in what APUA has to do regarding the supply of water to residents.
“The programme of development that we have to make sure that there is a sustainable and reliable supply of water in Antigua for the next several decades, requires many projects such as this one. So today, rather than celebrating this moment as a ‘touchdown’, or to suggest that we have reached the finish line, it is merely a milestone that we have accomplished,” he remarked.
APUA’s General Manager, John Bradshaw, has reassured water consumers particularly those in the northern section of the island, that they have not been forgotten.
“We recognized that Seven Seas were able to deliver this plant in record time and we want to apply the lessons learnt to the Barnacle Point plant which will serve the northern sections of Coolidge, Cedar Grove, Crosbies, Mount Pleasant, Friar’s Hill Development, New Winthorpes, Barnes Hill and all those developments in that part of the island,” he disclosed.
These areas will have water 24-hours per day when that new plant comes on stream shortly. He also disclosed that along with the plant at Barnacle Point, APUA will bring into service a plant at the Crabbes Peninsula adding additional capacity to the overall production of water.
