Water board urges government to forge ahead with desalination

THE NICOSIA Water Board yesterday urged the government to abandon its cautious approach and forge ahead with the planned expansion of desalination facilities.

Good winter rains have persuaded President Clerides to call for a go-slow on plans to build a second desalination plant at Larnaca and two mobile plants near Ayios Theodoros and Zakaki.

But Nicosia District officer Andreas Papapolyviou, in his capacity as chairman of the Nicosia Water Board, yesterday insisted more desalination was a must despite the rains. Nicosia residents could otherwise have no hope of relief from water restrictions that have been in force for months, he said.

“Already, since the beginning of March, water supply has been restricted to three times a week, and the nightmare of 1998 has started to come alive again for the 200,000 Nicosia Water Board consumers,” Papapolyviou said yesterday.

“These consumers would certainly be helped if the desalination plants, particularly the one at Larnaca, were fully operational,” he said.

There have been strong objections to all three proposed new plants by the local residents.

The plants have been touted by the government as the solution to the island’s chronic water crisis, but Clerides now believes that, given a bit more rain, the water currently behind dam walls will be enough to see us through the Summer.

Papapolyviou said the water board were all for increasing the price of water as a conservation measure.

He also expressed support for using recycled waste water for irrigation and for the recharging of groundwater reserves, which he said had been “dangerously” overexploited in the last 30 years.