Water supplies are to be further reduced next week in Taichung and Hsinchu and Miaoli counties, as the first “orange alert” since 2015 is set to be issued on Wednesday next week, the Ministry of Economic Affairs said yesterday.
The three, as well as Taoyuan, Tainan and Chiayi County have been under a “yellow alert” amid a “historically difficult” dry season, it said.
Areas on yellow alert have their water pressure reduced and the public is encouraged to conserve water, while an orange alert entails limiting total water use as well as reducing the water pressure.
Photo: Huang Pei-chun, Taipei Times
Recent rains have almost filled the Feitsui Reservoir (翡翠水庫) in New Taipei City, but hardly any rain has fallen south of Taoyuan, Minister of Economic Affairs Wang Mei-hua (王美花) said.
“Rain has been plentiful in Taipei and Yilan recently thanks to the monsoon,” Wang told reporters before attending the fifth meeting on the water situation at the Central Emergency Operation Center. “But south of Taoyuan, all the dams are at record low levels.”
Meteorologists have predicted that rainfall would continue to be sparse until June, due to the La Nina effect, Wang said.
“Heavy industrial users will need to reduce their water use by 7 percent while non-industrial large users, such as swimming pools and saunas, will eventually have to reduce their use to 20 percent,” Wang said. “Regular users will not be limited in their water use, although their water pressure will continue to be reduced overnight.”
Agricultural users are to be the hardest hit. Farmers in Hsinchu, Miaoli and Taichung would not be able to irrigate their first-harvest rice crops next year.
Irrigation has already been halted in Chiayi and Tainan.
The fate of Taoyuan’s first-harvest rice crop is to be decided on Tuesday next week, when another meeting at the center on the water situation is scheduled, Wang said, adding that recent rains and the possibility of transporting water are mitigating factors.
“We have 130 million tonnes of water in Taoyuan right now,” Wang said. “We need 150 million tonnes.”
Progress in water transportation has brought some relief, she said.
“We are moving more than 800,000 tonnes of water a day from the Feitsui Reservoir [to the greater Taipei area] and more than 200,000 tonnes of water from Kaohsiung to Tainan,” Wang said. “The pipeline between Taoyuan and Hsinchu will be completed in January.”
“We will not limit water use right away,” Wang said. “We do not have enough for agriculture, but there is enough for the public and for industrial use if we are thrifty.”
The last time an orange alert was issued was 2015, when an alert was issued for Taichung, Miaoli, Keelung, Hsinchu and Tainan, while a “red alert” was issued for Taoyuan, New Taipei City and Kaohsiung.
During a red alert, the most severe level, rotating water stoppages are enacted, with priority given to the general public, medical, defense and industrial users.
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