GEORGE TOWN: The Penang Water Supply Corporation (PWSC) is calling on Penangites to reduce their water consumption by 10 percent from now until June to guarantee an adequate supply for the state throughout the year.
Chief executive offier K. Pathmanathan, advised consumers to also conserve water until the arrival of rain to replenish the raw water reserves of the Air Itam and Teluk Bahang Dams.
“In March, PWSC recorded 66.5 millimetres (mm) of rain in the Air Itam Dam catchment area and has been working to ‘stabilize’ the effective capacity of this dam through the implementation of the Air Itam Dam Action Plan 2024 (AIDAP2024).
“The dam’s effective capacity dropped by two percent within a 31-day period, while the Teluk Bahang Dam saw an 11 percent decrease during the same timeframe, with 133 mm of rainfall recorded in its catchment area in March,“ he said in a statement today.
He clarified that the maximum effective capacity of the Teluk Bahang Dam stands at 18,240 million litres (ML), while that of the Air Itam Dam is 2,160 ML. Therefore, a one percent decline in the effective capacity of the Teluk Bahang Dam roughly translates to an 8.4 percent decrease in the effective capacity of the Air Itam Dam.
Pathmanathan added that international weather forecasts indicate that the El Nino phenomenon, which is hot and dry in the first quarter of 2024, is likely to give way to the La Nina phenomenon, which is wet and rainy, from May, June, or July this year.
“METMalaysia predicts moderate rainfall for Penang throughout April, May, June, and July. However, this is only a forecast, and we cannot guarantee that the actual rainfall will be adequate to notably enhance the effective capacity of the Air Itam and Teluk Bahang Dams,“ he stated.
