Irish Water sends equipment to Ukraine to provide 1.6m litres of clean drinking water per day

Irish Water will send two containerised water treatment plants (WTPs) to Ukraine in response to urgent calls for support to provide clean water in the war-torn country.

he organisation said two mobile WTPs will be transported to Lviv immediately, to provide fresh drinking water for those most in need.

An estimated 1.4 million people have no access to safe running water across eastern Ukraine, according to a recent report from UNICEF. There are also fears that burials in parks, gardens and public areas could lead to contaminated drinking water.

The self-contained units are capable of treating up to 40,000 litres an hour each, which will supply 6,200 people with the equivalent of 1.6 million one litre bottles of clean water per day.

Both units contain filters, backwash pumps, ultraviolet (UV) reactors and all necessary pipework and equipment to enable the self-contained water solutions to be operational very quickly once they arrive.

Irish Water chief executive officer Niall Gleeson said access to safe water is a “fundamental human need” that can be taken for granted in Ireland.

“We know that the situation in Ukraine has resulted in water supply being disrupted entirely or severely polluted, meaning it is unsafe for drinking. We hope our donation of these two units will play a role to help some of the people suffering in Ukraine access safe water,” he said.

Niall Gleeson of Irish Water, Ukraine’s ambassador to Ireland Larysa Gerasko and Minister Darragh O’Brien with one of the mobile water treatment plants heading to Lviv, Ukraine

To aid the set-up on arrival, contact details are included in the units in English and Ukrainian to enable online support for any commissioning and operating queries which will be provided at no cost by Coffey Engineers, Galway. Videos detailing how to operate the WTPs have also been recorded in Ukrainian and made available online.

Minister for Housing and Local Government Darragh O’Brien praised Irish Water for the donation.

“This exemplifies the many ways Ireland, through its people and its state agencies, is showing its solidarity with the people of Ukraine in their time of need. This donation demonstrates collaborative approaches to providing practical and important solutions to support the Ukrainian people. These water units will benefit thousands who are struggling to source fresh, safe drinking water,” he said.

Ukrainian Ambassador to Ireland Larysa Gerasko said: “From across Ireland there has been so much support shown to our people and country. A basic right to clean water has been destroyed by Russia in a lot of regions and this donation will be essential to sustain those who are currently in absolute need. We thank everyone involved for their work and effort to get these vital water units to my homeland.”

While donating two units to Ukrainian authorities, Irish Water has also retained a third WTP on standby in case of an emergency water quality incident in Ireland.

The containerised water treatment units, which were built by Coffey on behalf of Irish Water, will be shipped to Ukraine on Thursday.

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Originally Appeared Here