Council will write to Irish Water seeking meeting over water quality

Council will write to Irish Water seeking meeting over water quality

THE CLONDALKIN area Committee of South Dublin County Council are to write to Irish Water seeking a meeting regarding water quality.

At the meeting of the area committee, Mayor and Councillor Mark Ward proposed a motion calling for Irish Water “to meet the Clondalkin councillors to discuss the many complaints from residents including limescale and sediments in the water following the recent change of supply of water to the Clondalkin area from Ballymore Eustace to Leixlip.”

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The motion was passed.

In their response to the motion, Council Management told Mayor Ward that the water supply area from Peamount Reservoir was changed by Irish Water for “regional operational reasons” in March 2018.  The change meant some areas of Clondalkin and Lucan are now supplied with water from Leixlip water treatment works which would have previously received water from Ballymore-Eustace water treatment works.

The Council added that they will be writing to Irish Water requesting a single item meeting to discuss this issue.

The Council informed the councillors that “Irish Water have established a Local Representative Service Desk which is committed to giving speedy responses.  This Service Desk can be contacted at localrepsupport@water.ie or at 1890 178 178.”

Speaking after the meeting Mayor Ward told Echo: “We have received many complaints about the water. The water smells and looks different. It has also affected the operation of appliances like kettles and larger appliances like dishwashers and washing machines.”

A Spokeswoman for Irish Water told The Echo: “The water supply in the Greater Dublin Area (GDA) comes from a number of different Water Treatment Plants, primarily the Liffey plants at Leixlip Water Treatment Plant (WTP) and Ballymore Eustace WTP.

“The water balance between the two is a function of the supply demand balance from time to time and is managed on a daily basis.

“Both are modern well run plants which fully meet all statutory drinking water standards. Since March, 2018 the supply of water from the Leixlip WTP has been extended to areas of South Dublin (Lucan, Palmerstown and North Clondalkin) because of increased demand overall in the network. This rebalancing of the supply from both plants is unavoidable in order to ensure a secure sustainable water supply to homes and businesses in these areas and avoid water restrictions and water outages.

Both the Leixlip and Ballymore Eustace supply sources meet drinking water regulations but have different characteristics, with Leixlip water being classified as moderately hard, compared to Ballymore Eustace.

“Hardness is a natural characteristic of much of Ireland’s drinking water supply. Hard water contains high levels of natural minerals absorbed from rock and soil. Hard water is not harmful to your health, in fact, the higher mineral content of hard water (such as Calcium and Magnesium) may confer health benefits above that of soft water.

“Irish Water does not chemically treat water to remove these mineral salts as they are naturally occurring and fully consistent with safe drinking water.”

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