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BWS: A New Back-Up Water Plant Already On Island
posted (December 31, 2019)
So, you've heard the long list of complaints from the village chairlady and hotel owners, but what do the utilities have to say? Well, they've both gotten their systems back up and running - but in BWSL's case, that's not at a hundred percent. The company put out a release this afternoon saying that for the next few days water will be supplied, but at a slightly lower pressure. That's because the company's 150,000 gallon reservoir has been depleted. And, there are some works on the plant that have to continue - so the company will continue to transport water to the island on barges.

As we told you last night all this happened because a drive shaft in the plant broke after 8 years of service. The replacement only lasted a few days before it also broke.

Today, we asked the Operations manager if this could have been prevented with regular maintenance:

Dave Pascascio, Operations Manager - BWS
"What we did yesterday was to dispatch a team out there to retrofit a shaft, a drive shaft that was made on the ground and installed and we were up and running with the plant at 9:45 p.m. last night. We immediately started to distribute water even though there was no storage. We were just putting out into the distribution the same volume we were producing to ensure that people get water immediately."

"We understand the time of the year, we understand the number of people on the island, so we are cognizant of that fact and we will not, we will do what we have to do to ensure that we increase pressures in the system."

Reporter
"This, however, has resulted in massive losses in the tourism sector. Coming from the island, once again, they are speaking of cancellations and that sort of stuff. It's not necessarily your fault as the company, but couldn't this have been averted at any point, at the point where the engineers or the guys on the ground were doing the installation and saw that it wasn't a proper fit?"

Dave Pascascio
"Like I said, they called me immediately. We didn't have another one in store because it's something that lasts eight years and we had the previous one in stores probably about five years, right. So we tried to order one, we couldn't because the place was closed. We ordered one already and that was fabricated last night and is being shipped but it won't reach Belize until Monday. But in the interim, the one that we, the M&E team, made on the ground yesterday is working as expected. The plant is fully functional now. The problem is to build storage based on demand. The plant can produce 150,000 gallons a day and the current daily average demand is 120,000 gallons per day. When you deplate storage completely, that is when it becomes very tricky to manage demand and to build back storage."

Reporter
"We saw the release yesterday, it says that the previous shaft lasted 8 years and this one lasted 5 days or less and you also spoke about a misalignment that it wasn't properly aligned and that may have contributed to it. The question immediately arises: a) was it improperly installed and; b) again, does BWSL have sufficient redundancies in place?"

Dave Pascascio
"The redundancy in Caye Caulker is storage and back up electricity supple which we recently installed a generator and true you said normally a shaft would last us 8-10 years. We changed out that one on the 23rd December and immediately upon installation I got the report that there was something wrong with the shaft, not the installation because they drew it to my attention. They tried to stabilize all the vibration in it but it was just not properly aligned, the shaft itself."

Reporter
"If the first shaft expired after 8 years of service, maybe you all should have taken the measure at a time of low demand to say you know what the shaft has been there for many years, it is showing wear, let us replace it now. You probably still would have had the failure, but you would not have had the effect on the community that you have had when this happens between Christmas and New Year at the height of their tourism peak."

Dave Pascascio
"True, but when you look at the age at our components at these plants we look at those very closely and we know the timing for all of them and so we time that, because I don't want to put a cost on things to say well we are justifying cost against the needs, but one of these shaft is not cheap, so we tend to maximize the use of it. We knew that we needed a second shaft. We know that we had to have one as spear and so that was on the ground for 5 years."

Reporter
"Does BWS accept that it may have to have greater redundancies in place, because if you are saying and I'm must take your word for it that the shaft have some type of defect, it was not an error installation, it was a defect. Do you all have to have a redundancy for the back up? a backup for the back up knowing that water is not an option, it is essential for life."

Dave Pascascio
"We are cognizant of that fact. Right now in Caye Caulker we have a 40,000 gallons in a container ready tp be commissioned. It was just unfortunate that that was not commissioned for this event. SO we have 2 RO plants on Caye Caulker and that's the backup system that we have out there."

As you heard, a new backup Reverse Osmosis plant is on the island and is waiting to be commissioned.

Bowen & Bowen is also chipping in. The company deployed a loaded water barge on an emergency mission to the Island village today. It carries 3,720 5-Gallon bottles, and and 7,680 1.75 liter Bottles which arrived this evening. Again, this is a donation. Bowen & Bowen CEO, Michael Bowen is quoted as saying, "we wanted to do something to help our fellow Belizeans, especially during this Holiday Season when they are hosting so many of our tourists. We hope our donation of Crystal Water brings some relief to the Caye Caulker Village." End quote.

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