Water demand on Sept. 4 was 500 million litres for Calgary water users, which is the upper limit of what is sustainable at the time of water main repairs in Calgary, according to Calgary officials.
"This is down from the day before and moving in the right direction, thank you," said Michael Thompson, Calgary's general manager of Infrastructure Services. "At this rate of water use, we are running the system at maximum capacity, which means we are stretching it beyond what is reasonable for long periods of time."
He noted there are only two and a half weeks to go in this construction period, after which water restrictions should be lifted.
The target water demand is 485 million litres per day. Anything above 500 million litres per day means underground water storage cannot be replenished by Calgary's water system, according to Francois Bouchard, Calgary’s director of capital priorities and investment.
Thompson stated that engineers came up with a means to increase capacity over the construction period, but there have been operational challenges due to the strain on the system. These challenges included a pump failure and a treatment system component issue. It could be hard to recover from issues like these at the current rate of water use, he said.
Potable water is not allowed to be used outdoors and the City of Calgary has issued 14 tickets for outdoor water use of $3,000 since the restrictions began. As of Sept. 4, the City of Airdrie has received 19 complaints and issued six warning tickets. Airdrie has not issued any actual violation tickets.
Progress of repairs
Repair progress remains on schedule to be completed by Sept. 23. There are eight worksites along the feeder main with 21 pipe segments requiring repair over the coming weeks.
Construction is ongoing at all 12 segments within sites one through four. Concrete has been poured at five segments and concrete curing continues. They have been able to remove forms around concrete pours at three of the repair sites.
At site five, excavation continues, while crews are now beginning to work on site six through eight.
