MIDCOAST Water says independent investigators have concluded equipment failure was the cause of last month’s chlorine contamination issues in Gloucester with the release of a preliminary report into the incident.
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Watering engineering specialists Hunter H2O this week provided their preliminary report into the incident to the management and board of MidCoast Water.
The report determined the cause of the high chlorine was due to the syphoning of hypochlorite into the clear water reservoir at the Gloucester Water Treatment Plant after the plant had shut down.
“The preliminary report is indicating the configuration of the hypochlorite dosing system is the root cause of the syphoning issue,” MidCoast Water’s acting general manager Brendan Guiney said.
“The report indicated ‘the syphoning of the hypochlorite solution into the clear water plant also explains the intermittent nature of the discharge of highly chlorinated water into the water reticulation system’.”
Hunter H2O acknowledged the plant was now being operated manually with the chlorine dosing system isolated after each run to ensure syphoning could not reoccur.
Mr Guiney said MidCoast Water had also installed an online residual chlorine analyser at the Gloucester plant to monitor treated water where results were recorded and alarmed and daily visual operational checks of chemical storage volumes.
A spokeswoman said the preliminary report did not comment on MidCoast Water’s response to the incident or make recommendations for improvements, however, these were expected to be addressed in Hunter H2O's full report.
The full Hunter H2O report is expected to be presented to the board of MidCoast Water in the next two weeks.
