Kevon Felmine

Se­nior Re­porter

kevon.felmine@guardian.co.tt

The Wa­ter and Sew­er­age Au­thor­i­ty (WASA) says it does not have enough wa­ter to pro­vide a fre­quent sup­ply to com­mu­ni­ties in Moru­ga but has iden­ti­fied sev­er­al im­prove­ment projects aimed at in­creas­ing dis­tri­b­u­tion to at least once or twice per week.

In re­sponse to a ques­tion from Guardian Me­dia re­gard­ing res­i­dents’ com­plaints of re­ceiv­ing a wa­ter sup­ply on­ly two to four times per month, WASA stat­ed: “The main chal­lenge af­fect­ing the fre­quen­cy of wa­ter sup­ply to cus­tomers with­in these sup­ply zones is the deficit in the avail­abil­i­ty of wa­ter to meet the de­mand.”

The au­thor­i­ty al­so con­firmed that the planned projects are ex­pect­ed to be com­plet­ed in the com­ing months.

Princes Town MP Bar­ry Padarath claimed on Tues­day dur­ing a Unit­ed Na­tion­al Con­gress meet­ing that 80 per cent of the Moru­ga/Table­land con­stituen­cy re­ceives a pipe-borne wa­ter sup­ply once a week. Guardian Me­dia vis­it­ed res­i­dents in Rock Riv­er, Cachipe, and Basse Terre, who re­port­ed re­ceiv­ing a sup­ply on­ly once every two weeks. In St Mary’s, res­i­dents said wa­ter is avail­able once per week, but fluc­tu­at­ing pres­sure pre­vents it from reach­ing the taps of cus­tomers liv­ing in el­e­vat­ed ar­eas.

Clar­i­fy­ing its dis­tri­b­u­tion sched­ule, WASA ex­plained that the Trin­i­ty Wa­ter Treat­ment Plant sup­plies parts of Cachipe, Rock Riv­er, Bois Jean Jean, Basse Terre, and Gran Chemin. Cus­tomers in this dis­tri­b­u­tion sys­tem re­ceive wa­ter on a ro­ta­tion­al ba­sis every 11 days.

It added that the Navet Wa­ter Treat­ment Plant serves St Mary’s and parts of Cachipe via St Julien and St Mary’s Boost­ers, with a dis­tri­b­u­tion sched­ule on ro­ta­tion every nine days.

WASA has iden­ti­fied sev­er­al projects for im­ple­men­ta­tion in 2025 to im­prove wa­ter dis­tri­b­u­tion in Moru­ga.

These in­clude clean­ing of the Trin­i­ty Dam, up­grad­ing the Trin­i­ty Wa­ter Treat­ment Plant, redrilling of Moru­ga Well No 1 at Pe­nal Rock Road and the Bla Cha Cha Trace, Basse Terre Vil­lage, Moru­ga Pipeline Project, which in­volves in­stalling ap­prox­i­mate­ly 1,200 me­tres of 100 mm PVC pipeline from Moru­ga Road along Bla Cha Cha Trace to up­grade the ex­ist­ing 2-inch pipeline.

WASA ex­plained, “These projects, which are ex­pect­ed to be com­plet­ed over the com­ing months, will pro­vide ad­di­tion­al wa­ter to re­duce the deficit in sup­ply and de­mand.”

E-billing in ef­fect

Mean­while, WASA has of­fi­cial­ly im­ple­ment­ed e-billing as the sole method for bill dis­tri­b­u­tion, mark­ing a ma­jor mile­stone in its dig­i­tal trans­for­ma­tion and sus­tain­abil­i­ty ef­forts. The change took ef­fect on Feb­ru­ary 3, 2025, and ap­plies to all cus­tomers.

WASA’s Cor­po­rate Com­mu­ni­ca­tions De­part­ment said yes­ter­day that the shift aims to mod­ernise cus­tomer ser­vice, en­hance ef­fi­cien­cy, and re­duce en­vi­ron­men­tal im­pact.

“This ini­tia­tive aligns with WASA’s com­mit­ment to sus­tain­abil­i­ty, cost ef­fi­cien­cy, and im­proved cus­tomer con­ve­nience. By elim­i­nat­ing pa­per bills, we are re­duc­ing our car­bon foot­print while en­sur­ing cus­tomers re­ceive their bills se­cure­ly and on time,” the state­ment read.

Un­der the new pol­i­cy, all new cus­tomers ap­ply­ing for a wa­ter ser­vice con­nec­tion must pro­vide an email ad­dress at the time of reg­is­tra­tion, as bills will on­ly be de­liv­ered elec­tron­i­cal­ly. Ex­ist­ing cus­tomers are al­so urged to up­date their billing in­for­ma­tion to pre­vent ser­vice dis­rup­tions. —With re­port­ing by Rhon­dor Dowlat