Water supply companies must ensure minimum distribution in the event of service interruptions

The National Superintendence of Sanitation Services (Sunass) modified the Quality Regulations for the Provision of Sanitation Services, with the aim of optimizing the criteria for defining the volume of drinking water that must be delivered to users as a minimum, when the provider company makes scheduled or unforeseen outages, as well as to improve supply and communication in the event of interruptions, in order to guarantee that users are not affected.

The aforementioned regulation established that, when the service is interrupted for more than 18 hours, or more than 6 hours in the case of health establishments, general fire departments and prisons, the provider company must supply all those affected through trucks. cistern or other modality that guarantees the quality of drinking water delivered. However, it did not require a minimum amount of water to be delivered on a daily basis.

The current modification establishes that, in addition to guaranteeing the supply and quality of drinking water supplied, the provider company must ensure the delivery of an adequate quantity; that is, a minimum daily volume for each unit of use affected.

This minimum volume has been established considering the user’s ability to collect and transfer water and the minimum amount to cover the basic needs of hydration, nutrition and hygiene, as recommended by the World Health Organization.

Likewise, it establishes that when the provider company uses provisional fixed supply points, these must serve a distance of no more than 300 meters, in order to avoid long transfers of users, avoid crowds and ensure social distancing due to COVID – 19.

Likewise, you must consider a maximum number of use units to supply each of the points and have manifold-type accessories or similar for the delivery of drinking water to more than one user simultaneously.

Communication

Also, the aforementioned regulation states that the service providers are obliged to inform or communicate in a timely manner, both to users and to Sunass, about unforeseen or scheduled interruptions, the reasons and start time of the cut, as well as the date and start of service restoration.

For its part, the amendment incorporates other aspects that the service providers must communicate, such as the means of drinking water supply to be used, the hours of operation of each means of supply, the expected date and time of reopening of the drinking water system, the locations of the places where the distribution of drinking water is going to take place and the distribution routes of drinking water, in case tanker trucks are used.

It should be noted that the provisions established in the amendment are mandatory for all provider companies from the day after the corresponding amendment resolution is published.

However, companies that have less than 100,000 drinking water connections will have a maximum period of six months to implement the provisions referring to the minimum supply volume, the number of temporary fixed supply points and the number of tank trucks.