The Tribune

By YOURI KEMP

Tribune Business Reporter

ykemp@tribunemedia.net

The Water and Sewerage Corporation’s (WSC) top executive yesterday said customers will enjoy “quite a few benefits” such as earlier leak detection through the utility’s switch to monthly billing.

Robert Deal told the Exuma Business Outlook conference, organised by TCL Group, that the state-owned water provider is also moving to automated meter readings as part of the transition away from its historical quarterly billings.

By employing more sophisticated technology, Water & Sewerage Corporation staff will be able to read meters more frequently and avoid the present labour intensive process where they physically have to exit their vehicles and access sometimes hard-to-reach locations on a customer’s property.

“We want to go to automatic readings where we can just drive by and pick up the meter readings,” Mr Deal said. Speaking on the switch to monthly billings, he said: “Of course, there are quite a bit of benefits for the customers as well, because customers will have a greater awareness of what’s happening with their water usage versus the quarterly bil.

“One challenge we have with a lot of our customers, when they’re billed on a quarterly basis, is if they have a leak in their house or a toilet is running, by the time they find out that there’s a leak it’s been going on so long and there’s quite a dispute between them and us as to how we will resolve that. We believe when on a monthly basis they will find out much quicker and it will be = a better perspective for both of us.”

The Water & Sewerage Corporation is now preparing to battle leakages from its Family Island infrastructure following success over the past decade in slashing such losses, known as non-revenue water, in New Providence.

Mr Deal added: “One of the key or principal areas we’re going to start is here in Exuma. We also want to bring the approximately 605 customers in these projects that we’re completing online. That’s about 425 in Little Exuma, another 130 in Barre Terre and about 50 in Black Point, and so that’s going to increase our customer base here and on the Exumass by about 31 percent.

“Also critical to us, we’re going to be using the network analysis findings to determine the optimum climate resilient solutions to best improve the water supply throughout mainland Exuma.

“We know that when we add Little Exuma that’s going to put additional pressure on our Georgetown desalination plant, and so we have to ensure that we have sufficient production capacity, sufficient storage capacity, of course, pumping capacity and we work very closely with BPL to ensure that we have, in the case of any incident, sufficient stand-by power capacity and generation capacity.”

The Water & Sewerage Corporation has not enjoyed a tariff increase since 1999, almost a quarter-of-a-century ago, with costs to the consumer being “heavily subsidised”. The utility’s water purchases on Exuma were “approximately $1.2m” for the period to end-September 2023.

Mr Deal said: “All of our sales in Exuma up to the first nine months of the year are about $900,000, so you can see the level of subsidisation required. One major issue that the corporation is addressing critically in New Providence, but have they expand into the Family Islands as well, it is always a question of non-revenue water.

“That’s water that is produced and put into the system, but not billed, and that can be due to stuck meters, under registration, connections that are not properly metered and, of course, leaks and so that’s a critical item that we are addressing.”