John Gormley (Dublin South East, Green Party)

The capital provision for water services infrastructure in 2009 is €500 million, which represents an increase of 1% on last year's outturn and reflects the Government's ongoing commitment to the sector. In the period since 2000, the Exchequer has spent €2.5 billion on the provision of wastewater infrastructure, with 144 major schemes completed. These schemes include the construction of very large wastewater treatment plants in Dublin, Cork, Limerick, Galway, Wexford, Drogheda and Dundalk. New wastewater treatment facilities were also provided in many other smaller urban areas. The increase in wastewater treatment capacity over the same period was equivalent to the needs of a population of 3.6 million.

Compliance with the general requirements of the EU urban wastewater treatment directive in respect of secondary wastewater treatment has also increased significantly over the past decade, rising from a compliance level of 25% in 2000 to some 92% at present. All of the remaining schemes are included in the water services investment programme 2007-09.

The wastewater schemes included in the programme are based primarily on regular assessments of needs, undertaken by water services authorities at my Department's request. Water services authorities will be asked to undertake updated assessments of needs in the middle of this year and these will be used as a key input to a review of the water services investment programme. Priority objectives for the new programme will include the need to deliver infrastructure required to expand and improve our wastewater treatment capacity in order to ensure the highest emission standards from our municipal wastewater treatment plants, to anticipate future economic and social development needs and to maintain progress towards compliance with the requirements of the urban wastewater treatment directive.

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