Summary Reader Response

Summary :

Singapore Water Story (2020) by Public Utilities Board (PUB) reports that, the current water demand in Singapore is about 430 million gallons a day and water demand in it's ever-increasing nature could almost double by 2060. Therefore, new water infrastructure such as desalination and NEWater plants has to be built in order to meet these future demands. In view of this, 85% of the future demands will be met via different strategies such as desalination of seawater, collection of water by local water catchments, conservation of water by PUB’s programmes and treatment of used water by NEWater. This is fitting for Singapore’s master plan as a developing global hydrohub as it aims to be independent after the 1962 Water Agreement with Johor expires. Concurrently, the government engages the community through the ABC Waters’ Programme and also, rewards volunteers for their contributions in line with the water cause. In short, effective and engaging are key elements to meeting the future water demands of Singapore.

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Summary Reader Response :

In the article, “Singapore Water Story (2020)”, Public Utilities Board (PUB) addressed the ever-increasing water demand of Singapore that could almost double in the coming years and what needs to be done to meet the water demand. I personally agree that the government is well on track to meet the rising water demand via their effective solutions such as building new water infrastructure and creating awareness about saving water through various forms of media and water conservation plans. According to China State Construction (CSCEC) ‘s website, the government has invested $4 billion into building new water infrastructure from 2017 to 2021. Moreover, a new project has been awarded to CSEC to build the new Tuas water reclamation plant which began on December 30^th with a contract period of 39 months. This plant would become the sixth water reclamation plant in Singapore. However, this alone would not suffice for Singapore to become self-sufficient by the year 2061 when the Singapore Water Agreement with Johor ends. In contrary, Mr. Lim Swee Say(Minister of Environment) in a parliament speech(2002) stated that Singapore could be completely self-sufficient in water by 2061. So what are the other solutions that the government has been utilizing?

 

To offset Singapore’s limited catchment area and minimal groundwater availability, the hopes of desalination plants advancing in osmosis technology must be met as well. Therefore, there are government-run research projects in Singapore that focus on the advancement of this osmosis technology. To further expound, imported water from Johor is considered as one of the four main national taps and if one of the tap is to “expire” per say, then the other three has to ramp up their supply even more. That is where, the government uses water conservation tax to penalise any disproportionately large usage of water. 

With that in mind, the government has used various forms of media to encourage the public to save water and also has initiated several water conservation plans such as Mandatory Water Efficiency Labelling Scheme, Water Closet Replacement Programme and Water Efficiency Awards that canopies both the domestic and non-domestic sectors. In effect, this has helped Singapore’s domestic per capita use of water from 165 litres per person per day in 2000 to 141 litres per person per day in 2018. Hence, Singapore targets an even lower water consumption rate which is 130 litres per person per day by 2030. In view of these efforts by the Singapore government, I strongly agree that Singapore would be well-capable of supplying the rising water demand with or without the imported water from Johor. 

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