The current nightly severe water restrictions in the Dublin region are to be lifted tonight, Dublin City Council announced this lunchtime.
However, the council has asked almost 1.5 million affected consumers to continue to continue conserve water as reservoirs which serve the region are still being replenished.
Customers in the four Dublin local authority areas, as well as parts of counties Kildare and Wicklow have been faced with a severely reduced or completely curtailed nighttime water supply for a week.
In a statement, Dublin City Council said that due to an increase in production at the Ballymore Eustace water treatment plant, and improvements in the volume of stored water, “the water shutdowns and severe pressure reductions that have been in place since 30th October 2013, will be lifted from this evening”.
The water authority thanked customers for their patience during the period of water restrictions. “Due to the co-operation of all water users, we managed to save a significant amount of water and our regional strategic storage, which was at an extremely and unsustainably low level over the past week, has improved” the statement said.
However, water storage at reservoirs continues to be below the level it would normally be at this time of year. As a result the council is to keep reduced water pressure in place in the evenings over the coming weeks, to allow storage levels to increase.
The council said reducing pressure now was normal activity for the time of year. This is to enable the council to to plan ahead for the high demand Christmas season, and to cater for the difficulties that the onset of extremely cold weather at this time of year can bring.
Water users should not be impacted by this reduced pressure and all users should receive a return of supply this evening, the council said.
According to Michael Phillips, Dublin City engineer, water production at Ballymore Eustace and levels at treated water reservoirs, will continue to be monitored on an ongoing basis.
Mr Phillips said the council “strongly” urged consumers to help conserve water by restricting their use of water during the day as much as possible.
" By making very small adjustments to some of our daily activities, we can help to significantly reduce the volume of water we use without impacting on our lifestyle. I would encourage everyone to visit taptips.ie which provides easy to follow and valuable tips on how to conserve water," he said.
