The Water Resources Agency is considering a subsurface water intake system at the Nanshih River (南勢溪) in New Taipei City’s Wulai District (烏來) in response to the high turbidity of river water caused by torrential rain amid concerns over water resources utilization and conservation in the area.
Deputy Minister of Economic Affairs Yang Wei-fu (楊偉甫) said subsurface water from the Nanshih River could be tapped to reduce the turbidity of raw water flowing into the Zhitan (直潭) purification plant in New Taipei City’s Sindian District (新店), which supplies most of Taipei’s drinking water.
The proposed combined use of surface and subsurface water is to be formally submitted at an inter-ministerial meeting on river and drainage basin management held by the Executive Yuan next week, Yang said.
Referencing a subsurface water intake system on the Gaoping River (高屏溪) in southern Taiwan, Yang said a facility that could draft 10,000 tonnes of water per day would cost about NT$100 million (US$3.05 million) and the agency plans to spend NT$2 billion constructing a water intake system on the Nanshih River.
Subsurface water is shallow groundwater beneath a river bed or the Earth’s surface formed through the process of precipitation and infiltration.
Subsurface water could help replenish groundwater and reasonable drafting of subsurface water would not cause subsidence, making it a reliable reserve water source during torrential downpours or drought conditions, Yang said.
Yang said Taiwan has a long history of utilizing subsurface water, such as the Erfong Canal (二峰圳) in Pingtung County, which has processed 82,000 tonnes of water per day since its completion in the 1920s.
Authorities began highlighting the importance of subsurface water after Typhoon Morakot in 2009, which ravaged Taiwan and caused extremely turbid water in the Gaoping River, the agency said.
Filtered by layers of earth, the subsurface water is a cleaner source of water than surface water, which can be turbid due to an increasingly volatile climate, the agency said.
The agency established surface water intake facilities on the Gaoping River following Typhoon Morakot and the highest turbidity measured at the facility was 30 nephelometric turbidity units (NTU), much lower than the maximum recommended turbidity of 100 NTU, the agency said.
The facility can supply 300,000 tonnes of water even when Gaoping River water turbidity is high, the agency said.
Yang said that the cost of a multibillion-dollar construction project to build a 2.5km water pipeline from the Feitsui Reservoir to Zhitan water purification plant proposed by the Taipei City Government could be reduced if raw water to the purification plant is clean and that the water in the reservoir would not need to be released to dilute turbid water at the Nanshih River.
The agency said it would cooperate with the Taipei City Government to provide technical support.
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