MALOLOS
CITY—The City of Malolos Water District (CMWD) is bracing itself to meet the
increasing needs of its more than 230,000 population with its new board setting
plans for service improvement and expansion.
The
plans include the establishment of additional pumping stations and tree
planting activities.
Engineer
Bernie Buenaventura, a member of the CMWD board said that at present, the CMWD
has over 45,000 in concessionaires, each consuming a minimum of 120 liters per
day.
“Based
on our current estimates, we are having weak water pressure in some areas especially
during peak hours of the day,” he said noting that CMWD’s current pumping
capability is not enough.
A
licensed sanitary engineer, Buenaventura said that water demand is increasing
everyday, while supply of ground water is slowly getting depleted.
This
is due to aggressive developments of residential subdivisions in the city along
with construction large malls, not to mention that fact that this city is the
academic center of the province, he noted. An additional of at least 30,000
individuals will be added to the city population with the opening of classes in
the second week of June.
Buenaventura
said that open areas like rice lands were converted into residential
subdivisions, with concrete roads. He said the concreting of open areas reduces
natural replenishment of ground water.
Making
the situation worse is that at least three pumping stations of the CMWD are not
functional.
“We
need not only to replace old pumping station, we must also improve water
pumping capabilities,” he said.
As
this developed, Buenaventura asked concessionaires to conserve water while they
are hoping for the immediate implementation of the long delayed Bulacan Bulk
Water Supply Project (Bulacan Bulk).
The
said project is seen to address increasing water deficit in the city and
depleting ground water supply.
Buenaventura
also said that for a long time, the CMWD implemented no tree planting program
that will help preserve ground water.
“I
will propose tree planting program in the Board the soonest,” he said.
