NEW-water

2009-03-31T05:57:00.001-07:00

THE PROCESS OF NEWATER !

2009-03-31T05:43:00.000-07:00

VIDEO :http://www.pub.gov.sg/newater/NEWaterTech/PublishingImages/newater_process.swf
NeWater has been treated and further purified through this processes
3-step process :
=>Microfiltration-The treated used water is passed through membranes to filter out and retained certain particles. The filtered water only contains dissolved salts and organic molecules.
=>Reverse Osmosis(RO)-Has a semi-permeable membrane which only allows very small molecules like water molecules to pass through. Undesirable contaminants are unable to pass through the membrane. This reduced the level of salts and organic matters in the NeWater.
=>Disinfection by Ultraviolet Light-This production process acts as a further safety back-up to the Reverse Osmosis process. In this stage, ultraviolet is used to ensure that all organisms are inactivated and to ensure the purity of the water.

NEWATER is cleaner than PUB water =)

2009-03-31T05:22:00.000-07:00

Based on the table below, we can see that NeWater is clearer than PUB Water as it contains the least amount of suspended particle.

CLARITY
The river sources and reservoir water also contain more suspended particles. These particles are washed into rivers and reservoirs by rainfall running off the ground. NEWater on the other hand is clearer, even clearer than PUB water.

ORGANIC COMPOUNDS
The organic substance of NEWater is less than one-tenth of PUB water. Precisely because of that, industry users find NEWater to be attractive. For example, currently, the wafer fabrication plants take our PUB water and process it to reduce the organic substance to a level that is acceptable for their operations. Starting from next year, the wafer fabrication plants in Singapore will be using NEWater instead of PUB water because NEWater is cleaner than PUB water, and is more suitable for their operations.

BACTERIA COUNT

The bacteriological quality of water is a very important factor for potable use. Pathogenic bacteria are harmful to health and are found in animal waste and soil. Rain that falls onto the ground will carry the bacteria into the rivers and the reservoirs. Bacteriological quality of NEWater is as good as PUB water due to the fact that presence of bacteria and virus is not detectable, thereby meeting the World Health Organization's Standards.

pictures

2009-03-30T08:36:00.000-07:00

pictures of trip to new water visitor center

2009-03-30T08:10:00.001-07:00

Straits Times: Nov 2008

2009-03-30T07:33:00.000-07:00

It took three decades of research and hard work to perfect a multiple barrier water reclamation process.
'Singapore’s scientists are by no means miracle workers. It took three decades of research and hard work to perfect a multiple barrier water reclamation process. '
To ensure safety standards, the Public Utilities Board has taken several stringent measures, including 'a multi-barrier approach' in the design of the NEWater plants, comprehensive preventive maintenance programme and equipping plants with sensitive on-line instruments to constantly monitor water quality.
'More than 80,000 tests on water quality are conducted monthly, spanning the entire water supply network, that is, from reservoirs to taps to ensure that the water is safe to drink.'

Bibliography:
http://www.straitstimes.com/Breaking%2BNews/Singapore/Story
http://www.adb.org/Water/Actions/sin/NEWater-Sewage-Safe.asp#links

NEWater Visitor Center

2009-03-30T06:48:00.000-07:00

If you are interested in learning about new water
in a different view
you could always visit the NEWater Visitor Center.
You will be directed through the visitor center by a virtual guide "Wave"
You would get to see the new water factory as well as witness first hand
on the the operation of advanced membrane and ultraviolet technologies in the production of NEWater.
Tours could be booked at their website
or via telephone at 6546 7874/6541 0511
A private shuttle bus is provided for the people going to the visitor center

views of s'poreans

2009-03-29T03:11:00.000-07:00

this is from SINGAPORE FORUM !

What do you guys think about NEWater ?

Tckrto : As u guys already know , PUB has introduced 3 mgd of NEWater (about 1% of total daily water consumption) into our raw water reservoirs. The amount will be increased progressively to about 2.5% of total daily water consumption by 2011. Pricing of water will only go up and not down because of the expensive equipment invested and cost of operating and maintaining it.Give u all some idea how it worksRaw water/treated waste water ---> CMF ---> RO ---> UV ---> NewaterCMF removes organic contentRO removes all jia pa lang content and only allow water molecule to pass thruUV = ultraviolet to ensure that all organisms are inactivated and the purity of the product water guaranteedhttp://www.pub.gov.sg/NEWater_files/...ech/index.html
What i wanna discuss is whether u all accept it or think Newater sucks?
Leave all the political issue out.
Personally i will try not to drink it but LPPL as PUB already starts to mix newater into our raw water reservoirs liao
Currently i'm work in water treatment, so i know how it works dats why now think of newater abit yucks cause after all seeing all the treatment now i got phobia !!

martinchua : actually after hearing how it was processed last time, already dun like the idea.but its already mix, really LPPL loh

mew : never liked the "sweetened" taste of newater when they were giving out free bottles of it awhile back.the trip to the NEwater site and seeing those reverse osmosis tubes was kinda disturbing for me too.

martinchua : didnt even wanna haf a taste of it when they were giving out. n yea, the visit to the plant was rejected by me. heng i didnt go

longsiew : Long live New Water
Drink more would grant u new life
But hor. When u open the new water and store in the fridge for a day and then u take out next day and smell...................I don't wanna tell u what smell is that, u go and figure it out !!!

Puddie : I like the taste, honestly. Just don't think about the process..Hee

there you have it .
different views. and most of the time, til now,
many people do not want to try the NEWATER.

2009-03-29T03:06:00.000-07:00

cute right ?so save it before its gone !!

NeWater is safe

2009-03-29T03:01:00.000-07:00

ASSURANCE !!!

NEWATER is safe for drinking and industrial use.

Minister for the Environment and Water Resources Yaacob Ibrahim gave this assurance in his written answer to a question from Sembawang GRC MP Lim Wee Kiak in Parliament on Monday.

'Assurance that NEWater is safe for drinking and for use by the industries is a priority of PUB at all times,' Dr Yaacob said.

Due to NEWater's high purity, 'it is largely supplied to industrial and commerical users' that require higher quality water. Only 'a small amount of NEWater is blended with raw water in the reservoirs which undergoes further treatment for supply as drinking water'.

To ensure safety standards, the Public Utilities Board has taken several stringent measures, including 'a multi-barrier approach' in the design of the NEWater plants, comprehensive preventive maintenance programme and equipping plants with sensitive on-line instruments to constantly monitor water quality.

Critical operation control points are set in the NEWater plants to raise alarms and alert the operators; plant operation will automatically shut down in the unlikely event of membrane failure.

'PUB has in place a water quality monitoring programme to ensure that NEWater and tap water supplied by PUB are well within international drinking water standards including those of WHO,' said Dr Yaacob.

'More than 80,000 tests on water quality are conducted monthly, spanning the entire water supply network, that is, from reservoirs to taps to ensure that the water is safe to drink.'

'The test results and plant design and operations are audited every 3 months by an independent Internal Audit Panel chaired by a water expert from NUS.'

'Both Audit Panels have consistently found high standards upheld in plant design and operation, and most importantly, the quality of NEWater.'

is it popular?

2009-03-29T02:23:00.000-07:00

PUB has embarked on a new shift in Singapore water management. To ensure the sustainability of Singapore’s water, PUB encourages everyone in the 3P (People, Public and Private) sectors to take joint ownership of Singapore’s water resource management. Known as the 3P approach, this is embodied in PUB’s tagline – Water for All: Conserve, Value, Enjoy.

To encourage Singaporeans to enjoy our waterbodies, PUB has worked with sports organizations to introduce watersports such as canoeing, kayaking and sailing at selected reservoirs.
This is to encourage more Singaporeans to develop a relationship with water and bond with it. PUB believes that people who play with water will treasure it even more and want to be guardian of it. This is key to ensuring Singapore’s water sustainability for the future generations.

the problems faced..

2009-03-29T02:18:00.000-07:00

A comprehensive network of drains, canals and rivers channels rain water to Singapore’s reservoirs therefore keeping waterways clean of paramount importance.
After a heavy rain, the waterways often turn brownish in colour, when silt gets washed down from exposed earth surfaces and construction sites. To tackle the problem of silty discharge, PUB, the national water agency, has been working with the construction industry on concerted efforts in public education and engagement, technology upgrading, and enforcing good earth control measures.
To promote awareness, PUB jointly held seminars with the Construction Industry Joint Committee (CIJC), a grouping of eight associations in the construction industry, on erosion and sediment control.
To raise professionalism in soil erosion practices, PUB amended its Code of Practice on Surface Water Drainage in 2007 to provide more guidelines on how developers and contractors can effectively apply appropriate earth control measures at worksites. Now, developers and contractors submit to PUB appropriate earth control measures designed and endorsed by Qualified Erosion Control Professionals before the start of any construction work.
PUB and the Singapore Contractors Association Limited also jointly published a new guide book on erosion and sedimentation to highlight basic erosion control measures that contractors can adopt at construction sites to prevent silt discharges into waterways.

the process, the governent is responsible

2009-03-29T02:05:00.000-07:00

SAVE WATER. WATER IS FUN but after its gone ?

Raw water from various sources is conveyed by pipelines to the waterworks where it is chemically treated, filtered and disinfected. Treatment frees the water of harmful bacteria, makes it clear, sparkling, odourless, colourless, and safe for consumption.

Most treatment plants use chemical coagulation and rapid gravity filtration to remove suspended matter in the raw water. For chemical coagulation, correct doses of suitable coagulants and coagulant-aids are added to the raw water to combine or 'flocculate' the colloidal and larger particles of suspended matter. This causes the suspended matter to settle more readily and then be removed in the sedimentation tank. The water is then passed through rapid gravity filters which remove the finer particles of suspended matter. At Chestnut Avenue and Choa Chu Kang Waterworks, the suspended particles are removed by membrane filtration. The filtered water, on its way to the clear water tank, where it is temporarily stored, is disinfected with chlorine to get rid of all harmful bacteria and viruses. The water is then pumped into the distribution system and service reservoirs, ready for consumption.

Treatment Chemistry
Aluminium sulphate is the main coagulant. In most cases, hydrated lime is also added to adjust the pH of the raw water for the best flocculation results. Polyelectrolyte is used as a coagulant aid. For disinfection, chlorine is used to destroy the bacteria and viruses. Ozone is used, as well as chlorine, at Choa Chu Kang and Bedok Waterworks. Ammonia is added in the treated water containing free chlorine to form a stable chlorine residual. Activated carbon is also used to remove any bad taste and odour.

Sodium silicofluoride is added to the water on its way from the filters to the clear water tank. Fluoridation is a requirement by the Ministry of Health and has been a practice since 1957. It helps in the prevention of dental caries.

Singapore's water is moderately soft and is safe to drink straight from the tap. To ensure that your water supply is clean and safe, water samples are regularly collected and analysed chemically and bacteriologically at the Water Testing Laboratory. Samples of water at various stages of treatment at all waterworks, raw water from all sources, treated water from all service reservoirs and selected points in the distribution network are collected for daily or periodic analysis.

Tests are conducted to ensure that the quality of treated water is within the Guidelines for Drinking-Water Quality set by the World Health Organisation (WHO). The National Environment Agency also monitors the treated water quality.

the intro.

2009-03-29T01:51:00.000-07:00

NEWater may sound like an overnight success for Singapore. But its evolution is a journey that has spanned three decades.

Singapore's first water masterplan was drawn up in 1972. In 1974, PUB, the national water agency, built a pilot plant to turn used water into potable water. This was the precursor of today's NEWater factories. But it was ahead of its time. The costs were astronomical and the membranes were unreliable, so the idea was shelved to await further technological advancement.

In 1998, the necessary technology had matured and driven production costs down. In May 2000, the first NEWater plant was completed.

Currently, there are four NEWater plants in Singapore. The fifth NEWater plant at Changi will be Singapore’s largest NEWater plant. NEWater will meet about 30 percent of Singapore’s total water demand by 2010.

The NEWater Visitor Centre, which was opened in February 2003, is the focal point of PUB’s public education on NEWater. The centre highlights the importance of water and how Singapore leverages on advances in technology to reclaim water. Visitors are able to view firsthand the operation of the advanced dual membrane and ultraviolet technologies used to produce NEWater.

Ulu Pandan newater Selatar newater factory

the start.

2009-03-29T01:49:00.000-07:00

In 2001, PUB embarked on a new initiatives to increase water supply from unconventional sources for non-potable use. The use of NEWater for wafer fabrication processes, non-potable applications in manufacturing processes as well as air-con cooling towers in commercial buildings would free large amount of potable water for other potable purposes.

The NEWater Factories at Bedok and Kranji Water Reclamation Plants was commissioned at the end of 2002. Following that since Feb 2003, NEWater has been supplied to water fabrication plants at Woodlands and Tampines/Pasir Ris and other industries for non-potable use. In Jan 2004, another milestone in the NEWater initiative was accomplished with the commissioning of the third NEWater Factory at Seletar Water Reclamation Plant which began supplying NEWater to the wafer fabrication plants at Ang Mo Kio. The total capacity of the 3 NEWater factories is 92,000 m3/day or 20 mgd.

PUB has also completed its evaluation of the Expert Panel's report and accepted the proposal to use NEWater for indirect potable use in Sep 2002. This means mixing and blending NEWater with raw water in the reservoirs before undergoing conventional treatment at the waterworks for supply to the public for potable use. PUB initially introduced 3 mgd of NEWater (about 1% of total daily water consumption) into our raw water reservoirs. The amount will be increased progressively to about 2.5% of total daily water consumption by 2011.

The dispute ... yet the brand new start ..

2009-03-29T01:37:00.000-07:00

Due to its limited water resources, Singapore’s dependence on Malaysia for its supply has been traced to the first water agreement in 1927. With rising demand owing to increased domestic consumption and industrial growth, Singapore has been rated a highly “water-stressed” nation where the high premium placed on water is increasingly presented as a life-or-death gambit. This chronic dependency has ensnared it in the vicissitudes of “water politics", where Singapore’s sense of vulnerability was often accentuated whenever Malaysian politicians sought to exploit this asymmetry as a leverage tool to impose their policy or domestic agenda on the city state.

Immediately prior to Singapore’s independence, Malaysian Prime Minister Tunku Abdul Rahman candidly remarked to British High Commissioner Anthony Held that if Singapore’s foreign policy was prejudicial to Malaysia’s interests then we could always bring pressure to bear on them by threatening to cut off the water supply in Johore”. Because of the prickly relations surrounding the issue, much skepticism looms over the terms of the 1961 and 1962 water agreements which guarantee its supply under the specified terms until 2011 and 2061 respectively. A considerable level of insecurity has subsequently come to characterize Singapore’s bilateral relations with Malaysia, often exacerbated by vocal reiterations to prematurely terminate Singapore’s water supply whenever Malaysia’s elites felt the need to protest perceived slights, for instance in the context of the visit by Israeli Prime Minister Chaim Herzog in 1986, and the CIQ and CLOB disputes in the late 1990s. Perhaps, this link between survivability and Singapore’s water insufficiency was best articulated by then Prime Minister Lee Kwan Yew who stated in 1978 that, “if water shortage became urgent, in an emergency we would have to go in to Johore,forcibly if need be, to repair damaged pipes and machinery and restore water flow”.

The preponderance of the military dimension overlaying relations across the causeway has provided fertile ground for the promulgation of realpolitik as a mechanism driving the foreign policy between both states. Indeed, there is considerable support for this position owing to growing evidence of a veritable arms race underscoring the balance of power politics, and security dilemma posed by the active acquisition of offensive weaponry by both states. This essay however outlines a constructivist approach to provide an alternative lens through which Singapore-Malaysia relations can be analysed. As such, rather than to accept the dominance of power politics in an environment defined by anarchical relations between sovereign states as given, this approach posits identity as a variable in comprehending the insecurity described thus far. By identity, we refer to the varying constructions of the “[i]self[/i]” defined vis-à-vis the “[i]other[/i]”, wherein state identities are shaped within the context of their interactions and social environments. Security concerns and threat perceptions dictated by state interests thus rest upon the foundations of socially constructed identities, which then exert a feedback constitutive influence upon the cultural environment in which states are embedded as ontological actors.

Towards a Constructivist Security Strategy

Within this framework, the culture of insecurity perceived and internalized by Singaporean and Malaysian elites can be traced to the traumatic and chaotic political environment surrounding Singapore’s unceremonious eviction from the federation of Malaysia on 9th August 1965. Both states thus socially constructed their identities in the context of the often tense relations that followed, explaining the emotional baggage of a deep-seated vulnerability underlying Singapore’s foreign policy - a culture which has been constantly reinforced by reference to its limited physical scale, confined geographical scope and prevailing ethnic Chinese identity; much to the chagrin of its northern neighbour. This discomfiture was further exemplified by Singapore’s policy of pairing its consciousness of an innate vulnerability with a culture of competitiveness and exceptionalism. Consequently, the associated clear-cut sense of external threat as arising primarily from Malaysia and the latter’s subsequent suspicions explains why the water dispute remains such a contentious issue. Certainly, this was summed up aptly by Singapore Foreign Minister S Jayakumar who, in an address to Parliament in 2003 on the subject of the water dispute, remarked that “our very existence as a nation is at stake”.

From the constructivist perspective, these threat perceptions are socially constructed and thus amendable to change under permissive conditions; offering prospects for progress via the transcendence of imagined structural constraints. Two key developments may allow both states to vanquish the impediments of self help and distrust that the water issue has hitherto commanded. One concerns the change of leadership in both countries, with both leaders (and most of their reconstituted cabinets) belonging to the post-independence generation. As self-proclaimed pragmatic technocrats cognizant of the economic pressures of the highly globalized world, the ruling elites are likely to see the benefits of the mutual renunciation of rhetoric that often conflates the water relations with references to "threat, and "war".Notably, both leaders have concurrently issued public statements recently stressing a fresh commitment to improvement of bilateral relations, thus providing an impetus for the gradual eradication of the dominant threat-producing security discourse.

Another cause for optimism arises from the development of technology that enhances water resource management and alternative purification methodologies. While self-sufficiency may not yet be attainable for some time, the reduced water dependency and sense of vulnerability would enable Singapore to deal with a hypothetical premature termination of Malaysia’s water supply without resorting to military measures, hence leading to a moving discourse and eventual desecuritisation of the water issue. This opens up the possibility of restructuring the intersubjective culture of the two states; through widened policy and institutional options and reduced barriers to cooperation.

As such, state identities and interests are not given and can be transformed after interaction at the systemic level. Ultimately, the resolution of the security dilemma is incumbent upon the establishment of new norms of conduct as confidence-building measures are employed to construct a culture of greater transparency, which would ultimately benefit the inhabitants of both countries by reforming the regulative rules of anarchy and avoiding the dangers of its self-fulfilling prophecies. In the final analysis, it will be ideas, norms and rules arising through sociological interaction – not material forces like military might, which would contribute to the creation of an enduring peaceful and stable environment. Only with the development of a socially shared identity of cohabitation can all other unresolved bilateral issues be amicably addressed externally to the chicanery of various water politics.

A dozen pro-Taiwan independence activists set fire to a Singapore flag in the southern city of Kaohsiung October 1, 2004, to protest the anti-independence comments by the city state at the United Nations. The protest came after Taiwanese Foreign Minister Mark Chen called Singapore 'the size of a piece of snot' after the city state's foreign minister said that any push by Taiwan for independence could spark war with China.