Mr. Mike Quinn:

Good morning. My name is Mike Quinn and I am the group chief executive of Ervia, which is the parent company of the two regulated companies, Irish Water and Gas Networks Ireland. I am joined by Mr. Grant, managing director, Ms Claire Coleman and Ms Angela Ryan from Irish Water to discuss the water supply project for the east and midlands regions. I would like to thank the Chairman and the joint committee for the opportunity to present the details and status of the water supply project.

The recent Storm Emma event underlined that water supply to the greater Dublin area is critical, with 400,000 people losing supply for periods over two weeks because of increased demand. The situation is unacceptable and is due to the lack of margin of supply over demand in the region. Irish Water's central message is that unless we resolve that situation, these failures will occur more frequently and with greater severity. The impact of such failures will undermine confidence in the service, cause extensive social and economic loss and, ultimately, affect jobs now and in the future. Basically, the water system would become a constraint on economic growth.

After the latest - the fourth - round of public consultation, Irish Water has reviewed the water supply project in detail and considered all of the feedback. Irish Water is now confirming that the planned new water supply from the River Shannon at Parteen is the best way to meet the critical deficit in the east and midlands regions of Ireland from 2025.

Turning to the slides we have provided, the second slide details the policy framework. We are guided by national policy, which is brought up to date in the national planning framework and the new river basin management plan. Irish Water supports national policy through its water services strategic plan 2015 and the national water resources plan to be published in 2018. Irish Water has a statutory responsibility to develop its plans and programmes to ensure that present and future needs can be provided for in a secure manner.

The third slide shows the population growth to 2050. Working from the 2016 census data, it is estimated there will be an extra 600,000 of population in the greater Dublin area and a further increase of 120,000 of population in the midlands region.

The fourth slide shows today's water availability in the greater Dublin area. We can produce 598 million l per day of water safely against an average daily demand of 579 million l per day. This is a wholly inadequate margin which cannot deal with the risks to supply of demand. In any other water company, this would be considered an emergency situation. Indeed, Irish Water monitors the greater Dublin area demand balance, including the region's reservoirs, as a first priority every day for this reason. It is our single biggest risk.

The fifth slide shows the immediate projects we are trying to implement in order to maximise existing sources. We are improving our network capacity and upgrading our plants at Vartry and Srowland to be able to produce about 10% more water. This will give a maximum of 656 million l per day, which is the limit that will be available until the water services project can be built and put into service. This, plus leakage savings, will barely meet the growth over the next seven to eight years, so the contingency will remain highly marginal.

The sixth slide shows the dependence on the River Liffey. We depend on the Liffey for 85% of our daily needs and this is based on 41% of the average Liffey flow, which is extraordinarily high. This is absolutely the limit of what is available, both technically and legally.

The seventh slide shows that demand is growing and has outstripped supply. The graphic shows the steady rise in the average daily demand in the greater Dublin area. Normal demand reached 577 Ml per day in quarter 1 of 2018, up from 540 Ml per day in 2014. However, as members can see, the effect of Storm Emma took the demand to 636 Ml per day, which is more than we can produce. As a result, we had to restrict supply, causing loss of water to almost 400,000 people at peak. This failure is unacceptable and causes major hardship and loss to communities and businesses. Without the water services project, this will happen with greater frequency and severity if nothing is done to provide a new source.

Mr. Grant will outline the challenge of leakage and the basis for our future demand estimates.