Water for Singapore

Water for Singapore

By: Samuel Tan 2i217

Singapore: Two young tanned canoeists paddled across the clear waters of the new Marina Barrage. They were just one of the few people that had started to reap the benefits of the Marina Barrage. The Marina Barrage, the 15th reservoir of Singapore that was opened in the recent years, has three functions, mainly water supply, flood control and lifestyle recreation. Other than the Marina Barrage, Singapore also has many other ways of getting fresh water. The other ways are desalination, NEWater, stormwater management and the buying of fresh water from other countries.

Although Singapore may be a small country, but the amount of water it uses is a lot compared to other bigger countries. Singapore’s current per capita domestic water consumption is about 154 litres per day, compared to India which only used 135 litres per day. This may not seem like a large problem to most people as it does not seem important. Think it this way, Singaporeans do not have to think about running out of water when they turn on the tap or drink a glass of water. Singaporeans are getting too complacent with what they have, ignoring the droughts in other country as they struggled to get enough water for everyone in the country.

Singapore gets its water from the water from local catchment, imported water from Johor, desalinated water from the sea and recycled water from NEWater. However, the imported water from Johor may be cut off in the future in 2061 when the contract ends. Although the government promises Singapore that they will be able to provide water for the whole nation by then, it is still not cost efficient.

To use local catchment to get water may take up too much space, according to projections from government that reservoirs and catchment areas will take up 50% of the island in the future. It will be a challenge to balance the socio-economic development and water sustainable development.

Desalination is also not a good method. To desalinate the sea water, that will require a lot of fuels to heat up the water in order to remove the salt. As we all know that the price of fuel is not cheap, the amount of money spent to desalinate is not little. Other than it not being cost efficient, it is also not environmentally friendly. It uses up so much energy but it is only capable of meeting 10% of Singapore’s water need with a production capacity of 136 million litres daily.

NEWater may save us a lot of water because of the unique system of recycling water to produce fresh drinkable water. However, the process is not simple as the “used” water has to go thorough microfiltration, reverse osmosis and UV rays in order to come out as fresh drinkable water. The problem is that the cost of the whole system is not cheap.

Design water treatment capacity

Unit cost

US$ / ( /d)

3785 614

7570 539

11355 500

15140 474

18925 455

22710 440

26495 427

30280 417

34065 408

37850 400

Self-made table with info from http://www.costwater.com/membranes.htm

From the above table, we can see that the membranes are not cheap and the constant maintenance will take up a lot of money that could have been used to invest in other sectors of the economy.

Pollution also has to be tackled. We would not want our water catchment areas to contain contaminated water. As the government has projected that half of the island will be water catchment areas and reservoirs, we must ensure that the industrial waste must not contaminate the waters.

As Singapore has limited amount of water, we must ensure that all the water pipes and systems are not leaking and well-maintained. These are to ensure no water is wasted. The government should also close the water loop of Singapore. In order to conserve the water that we have, we should not discharge used treated water to the sea. The water should be treated again to save the water. When you discharge the water back to the sea, the water will turn salty and it needs to undergo desalination again in order to be drinkable again.

The most important solution is to save water and minimize our usage. When we do not use much water, there will be no need to build a lot of catchment areas and facilities. This will help save a lot of money. Water for Singapore will turn better.