Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees

Wednesday, 28 May 2025

Committee on Infrastructure and National Development Plan Delivery

Uisce Éireann: Future Work Programme

2:00 am

Mr. Seán Laffey:

Since the need across all of our portfolios is so big, we will take the €10 billion and roughly split it 25% for water treatment, 25% for water network, 25% for wastewater treatment and 25% for wastewater networks. We pretty much spend equal amounts on each per annum. We might spend a little more on water treatment because that directly affects public health. As Ms O'Dwyer indicated, though, between €55 billion and €60 billion needs to be spent on the networks and our assets out to 2050. It is a complex piece of work because, if I am building a new treatment plant in one place, a number of other things are still happening at other treatment plants. I am using up all the headroom and the other plants are getting old. They need capital maintenance and might need to be refurbished. Last year, we brought in a new drinking water directive, which has changed the way we look at drinking water and how we treat it. In the next two years or so, there will be a revised urban wastewater treatment directive, which will also change how and the standards to which we treat our wastewater. It is a complex piece of work. There are a lot of moving parts. As Ms O'Dwyer pointed out, we invest on the basis that we have European Court of Justice cases against Ireland Inc. regarding trihalomethanes on the drinking water side and, on the wastewater side, for not meeting the urban wastewater treatment directive standards. That is how it is prioritised.

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