by George Alleyne, Newsday TT

The People's National Movement (PNM) must share part of the blame for the around the corner increase in the country's water rates, which has been attributed by Government to the cost of water produced by the desalination plant. Indeed, had a PNM Administration acted on a recommendation made by a United Nations water development expert, as early as the 1970s, the 1995-2001 United National Congress (UNC) Government would not have dared conceive the idea of a desalination plant.

Instead, the former UNC Administration arranged for the construction of the plant, which cost considerably more pro rata than a desalination plant in Barbados, and has reportedly led to the upcoming increase in water rates. Today, the UNC, almost with tongue in cheek, condemns the anticipated increase in water rates.

Yet Trinidad and Tobago's domestic, industrial and agricultural water needs, as I had pointed out in an earlier Column, would have been met well into this century if a recommendation put forward by a UN water development expert in the 1970s had been accepted by an earlier PNM Administration.

The expert, J E Portauborde, Inter-Regional Adviser on Water Development, UN Office of Technical Co-operation Centre for Natural Resources, Energy and Transport, had recommended that a feasibility study be done on a proposal to construct a reservoir in the Caroni Swamp. The reservoir, according to estimates, would have stored 13 billion gallons of water, as well as produced in excess of 300 million gallons of water a day, or more than five times the design production capacity of the Caroni-Arena project. In turn, the construction of such a large capacity reservoir into which several rivers would have emptied, along with the widening and deepening of the rivers would have minimised flooding in several areas.

Construction costs were put at $100 million, or one-third of the original estimated cost of the Caroni-Arena project. An incidental benefit, Portauborde had pointed out, would have been that the surrounding Caroni mangrove swamp, short of run-off water supply, could have been eventually reclaimed through the "polders" technique. This technique, in which land is reclaimed from either the sea or a river, has been employed by the Dutch, for example, for centuries, with the process yielding considerable benefits.

Portauborde had advised on a "thorough technical and economic study" of the proposal to build the reservoir. The UN official, who had been specifically commissioned to study and report on this country's water development, including its water distribution systems, noted that the most promising of all the projects he had considered had been that of "the exploitation of the water resources of the entire Caroni River basin".

The People's National Movement and the United National Congress Administrations, for whatever the reasons, did not pursue his advice. Had the original proposal, which Portauborde had hailed, been accepted, the former UNC Government, even brass faced as it was, would never have advanced the idea of the construction of the desalination plant, whose water production is but a fraction of the earlier advanced Caroni Swamp project.

The former UNC Government, whose adviser on Water Resources development, was the late Elton Wyke, author of the proposal, which would have provided Trinidad and Tobago with the estimated additional 300 million gallons of water a day, clearly knew of Wyke's careful study and proposal.

But the UNC Government would not have been interested in Wyke's proposal for the construction of a 13-billion gallon reservoir in the Caroni Swamp. I restate some of the merits Portauborde had seen in the Wyke plan.

1) All the drainage water of the entire Caroni Basin (including the San Juan, Guyamare, Cunupia, Capano rivers et cetera) amounting to well over 300 million gallons of water per day could be captured and stored;

2) The construction cost of the 13,000 x 10(6) (13 billion) gallons reservoir necessary to store this water will be relatively cheap (4.5 metres high, zoned earth embankments) and no compensation will have to be paid for State land;

3) The Caroni Swamp being the lowest lying areas (sea level), no pump lifting will be required except for lifting the water to the treatment plant; energy costs will therefore be low;

4) A sizeable portion of the stored water could be used without treatment for irrigation and industrial purposes;

5) Due to the proximity of the main area of demand, pipe systems will be minimum;

6) The water quality (after seawater intrusion is controlled) will be good because of the fairly long detention period involved, and treatment costs will therefore be reduced;

7) The large reservoir proposed will be adequate for fish culture; and

8) The surrounding mangrove swamp, short of run-off water supply, could be eventually reclaimed through the "polders" technique.

Portauborde had suggested, however, inter alia, that the sites of diversion weirs on the various rivers should be determined in relation to the tidal effects, and tide control gates provided, and the possibility of pollution from industrial waste waters should also be carefully studied.

Government should have a rethink on the proposal.