Housing and Water Minister Irfaan Ali yesterday said that government has invested significantly in the Georgetown Central Sewerage System (GCSS) and several projects are in the main to further modernise that operation.

He made these remarks in response to a recent Kaieteur News article headlined “Sewage system on verge of collapse due to neglect”.

Speaking with the Guyana Chronicle, Ali pointed out that the GCSS provides service to approximately 50,000 residents, covering an area bounded by the Demerara River in the west, Vlissengen Road in the east, the Atlantic Ocean in the north and Sussex Street in the south.

He also said that a satellite sewer network which benefits approximately 4000 residents is located in Tucville.

These two systems, the minister noted, are interconnected via a trunk main which originates at the Tucville Septage Receiving Facility, and terminates at the junction of Brickdam and Boyle’s Place.

This network was constructed in the early 1900’s and was initially designed to serve a population of about 10,000.

However, he said, from that time to now, the population has increased by more than five times its design capacity, resulting in the limited performance of the system.

Much of this growth occurred between 1970 and 1990, when the management of the system was under the remit of the Georgetown City Council.

Ali stated that despite the obviously increased demand on the system, its poor performance was exacerbated by a lack of maintenance and also failure to invest in the expansion of the system.

He explained, as such, core components of the system began to fail and eventually led to the inoperable state of almost all the sewer pumping stations.

But the minister stressed that change was brought to this totally unacceptable situation in 2002 with the passing of the Water and Sewerage Act, which removed the responsibility of the sewer system from the City Council.

This task was placed under the purview of the newly formed Guyana Water Incorporated, and at that point a major investment portfolio of approximately G$1100M was unveiled, comprising the following:

* rehabilitation of the Tucville Septage Receiving Station which was completed at a cost of some $85M, and benefitted about 4,000 residents;

* construction of the force main interlinking the Tucville and Central Sewer Systems to the tune of $40M, thereby improving the removal of sewage from the Tucville area;

* construction of a new $400M outfall in Kingston to serve the entire population which benefits from the sewer network in Georgetown;

* procurement of sewer pumps – currently tendered with an estimated cost of G$100M. These pumps will be used as replacements in the existing sewer pumping stations;

* procurement of materials for the rehabilitation of street sewers. The tenders for this project which costs some $330M are currently under evaluation;

* tenders for the structural rehabilitation of all 24 sewer pumping stations, which costs $100M, are currently under evaluation;

* the terms and reference of the consultancy for review and update of the sewer master plan are currently being developed. This project is priced at an estimated $75M.

According to Ali, the projects contained in items one to six of the plan will improve the reliability of the system, paving the way for its complete rehabilitation.

He pointed out that the consultancy work will form the basis for this complete rehabilitation under a new loan with the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) scheduled for 2010.

These strategic investments, the minister underscored, aim at increasing the capacity of the network to provide service for the next 30 years.

Ali also mentioned that apart from this issue, his ministry is working feverishly to address the water woes across the country.