New tunnel seen to give Metro stable water supply
President Marcos on Friday assured households and businesses in Metro Manila and its nearby provinces of a more reliable and stable water supply after he led the opening of a new tunnel under the Angat Water Transmission Improvement Project in Bulacan province.
The project’s Tunnel No. 5 reinforces the decades-old Umiray-Angat-Ipo-La Mesa system, through which 90 percent of water used by nearly 20 million people in Metro Manila, Bulacan and parts of Cavite and Rizal provinces flows.
“Its raw water conveyance to carry over 1.6 billion liters of water every day will increase our system’s transport capacity from 6 billion to almost 8 billion liters of water every day,” the President said in his speech at the ceremonial unveiling of the project marker at Bigte Basin, in Norzagaray, Bulacan.
“This means more families will have a continuous and reliable water supply in their homes. The older tunnels can also be repaired because there is now a backup route for the water to pass through,” he added.
Mr. Marcos said he wanted the project to serve as a reminder to value natural resources and use them responsibly.
Situated between Ipo Dam and Bigte Basin, Tunnel No. 5 consists of a 4.3-meter-diameter, 6.4-kilometer raw water conveyance tunnel designed to carry up to 1,642 million liters a day.
Its main purpose is to provide a backup water route, allow maintenance on existing tunnels and aqueducts, and improve system reliability during earthquakes and other natural calamities.
