0 Water supply in Jimbaran remains tenuous

A few areas of Jimbaran may have seen an immediate improvement in the availability of tap water late last week, but residents in other parts of the elite area of southern Bali still only have a trickle to fulfill their daily needs. “Nothing has changed yet. The water is still running, but very weakly, just like every other day before,” said I Wayan Sukamta, the former neighborhood head of Buana Gubug hamlet in the Jimbaran subdistrict of Kuta Selatan. Over the past year, Sukamta’s hamlet and the four neighboring hamlets of Cenggiling, Mekarsari, Anggaswara and Taman Griya, have experienced irregular shutoffs of their water supply by PDAM Badung. 

“When the water does run, we can only turn on one tap at a time in my home,” he said, stating that up to 700 families in his neighborhood relied on PDAM Badung as their only source of clean water and had suffered such conditions and even worse for over a year. “I believe that PDAM is obliged to provide more water towers in the higher areas, so that whenever disruptions occur to the pipe network, residents don’t always have to be disadvantaged,” said Sukamta. The neighboring hamlet of Cenggiling is seemingly more fortunate than Sukamta’s, as water has started to run smoothly since last Thursday. 

“The day it [the Bali Daily article] was published, the water came back to normal with the proper pressure. Until today it’s still working... Without even stopping for 24 hours,” said Reni Susanti Radi, a resident for the past six years in Cenggiling hamlet, who has become accustomed to surviving for two to three days at a time without running water at home. Just like Sukamta, Reni has been purchasing drinking water in refill gallon bottles for bathing whenever the water stops running. City tap water company PDAM Badung acknowledged it was still unable to guarantee the continuity of water distribution in the coming days. 

“About three days ago, we finally repaired the broken pump at Estuary Dam. So now, all the six pumps to distribute water to the higher areas, including to Unggasan, are functioning properly. The broken pump was the cause of the decrease in water pressure,” said Jana Wirka from the PDAM Kuta Selatan office. However, he also said that that a rotating schedule of water shutoffs would remain a temporary solution to be taken whenever required. “We are still in the process of installing additional pipes to better distribute water to the higher areas. 

The installation will be complete around June and the resulting transfer of flow to the new pipes is likely to cause disruption to water services in some areas,” said Jana, giving his assurances that announcements would be made through television broadcast prior to any disruption. “However, we cannot constantly make announcements about service disruptions. Who knows if something unscheduled happens and one of the pumps breaks as they are operating 24-hours nonstop, or if a rupture occurs in the pipes?”

source : bali daily