Wa­ter and Sew­er­age Au­thor­i­ty (WASA) from to­mor­row will be­gin a new se­ries of work on the largest pipeline re­place­ment project to be un­der­tak­en in the his­to­ry of the util­i­ty with the change-out of 40 kilo­me­tres of the Hol­lis Trunk Main (North). The project is ex­pect­ed to cost an over­all $201 mil­lion and would be ex­e­cut­ed over an 18-month pe­ri­od, a state­ment from the util­i­ty said yes­ter­day.

The pipeline, which ex­tends from the Hol­lis Reser­voir, Va­len­cia, to the East­ern Main Road, Laven­tille, was orig­i­nal­ly con­struct­ed in 1936. The re­place­ment of the south­ern por­tion of the 10-kilo­me­tre Hol­lis Trunk Main was com­plet­ed on Oc­to­ber 23, 2012. This was achieved at a cost of $20.9 mil­lion, the re­lease added.

The au­thor­i­ty said the project would be ex­e­cut­ed in six phas­es even­tu­al­ly end­ing at the Hol­lis Wa­ter Treat­ment Plant, Va­len­cia. Work un­der phase one be­gan last Ju­ly 2012 with the in­stal­la­tion of 1.6 kilo­me­tres of 400-mm di­am­e­ter pipelines from Co­conut Grow­ers As­so­ci­a­tion (CGA) along Old St Joseph Road to Pash­ley Street, Laven­tille.

An­oth­er com­po­nent of phase one would al­so be­gin to­mor­row with the in­stal­la­tion of 3.9-kilo­me­ter of 500-mm di­am­e­ter pipelines along the Pri­or­i­ty Bus Route from Pash­ley Street, Laven­tille, to El So­cor­ro Road, San Juan. Over­all phase one would en­tail the in­stal­la­tion of ten kilo­me­tres of pipeline stretch­ing to the Val­sayn Wa­ter­works.

Ben­e­fits of the project:

• Im­proved lev­el of ser­vice to cus­tomers served by the Hol­lis Trunk Main;

• Re­duced leak­age and loss­es of wa­ter along the trans­mis­sion and dis­tri­b­u­tion sys­tems;

• In­creased pres­sures to boost­er sta­tions;

• Im­prove­ment in re­li­a­bil­i­ty of sup­ply to var­i­ous com­mu­ni­ties along the East West Cor­ri­dor.

The au­thor­i­ty said in May 2011 it com­mis­sioned the re­place­ment of 28.7 kilo­me­tres of the Navet Trunk Main, then the largest project to the un­der­tak­en by the util­i­ty, at a cost of $117 mil­lion. WASA said the re­place­ment of the Hol­lis Trunk Main forms part of it's broad­er mains-re­place­ment pro­gramme to ad­dress the prob­lem of aged and leaky mains, which is a ma­jor con­tribut­ing fac­tor to the high per­cent­age of un­ac­count­ed for wa­ter, which ranged be­tween 40 to 50 per cent.