Ryan Phillip, Geologist and Assistant Water Engineer at St. Kitts Water Services Department, said that the Federation does not have a water storage issue, however, there is the matter of inadequate water sources hence the reason why the department is undertaking a well-drilling campaign to locate more water sources to meet the demands of the people.
“I don’t think that we have a water storage problem, it is that we have to find more sources of water and we also need to reduce our use of water,” said Mr. Phillip during his March 17 appearance on ‘Working for You.’ “So, what we are really looking at now is continuing our well-drilling campaign to find more water and I think that essentially is the first step that we would have to take.”
Mr. Phillip said that once the drilling is successful then there is the possibility of building additional catchment systems.
“So, we find more water, and then we might be able to say we can build another 500, 000-gallon tank in a certain community but as it stands, we struggle to fill the smaller tanks that I would add – a very expensive endeavour,” he said. “It may not help the situation that we are faced with today.”
Given the amount of water accessed from various sources and the number of wells located around the island, Mr. Phillip said that constructing larger catchment tanks in various communities may not be practical.
“We get 70 percent or thereabout of water from groundwater and about 30 percent from surface water and then we have about 30 well sites around the island that produce from… just over 350 imperial gallons per minute to some of them producing 25 gallons per minute,” he said. “If we are really to look at the system and to look at the little intricacies of it… it may not be feasible to have larger tanks in certain communities because the community may be fed by a 25 gallon per minute well and you know if we have a tank that is 500, 000 or one million gallons it would never be full,” he added.