Hi-tech drinking water facility for Waipātiki

Waipātiki residents celebrate the completion of the community’s new water treatment facility.

Waipātiki residents got a close look at the community’s brand new water treatment facility on Saturday, October 15.

The completion of the sixth small community supply is another milestone on Hastings District Council’s path to ensuring all of Hastings’ water supplies are safe and resilient.

After the facility was blessed by kaumatua Bevan Taylor, Hastings councillor Tania Kerr thanked all of those involved in the planning and construction of the new drinking water storage and treatment plant – particularly Bill and Anne Perry who came to an agreement with Council on the provision of land for it.

Project manager Steve Cave told the gathering that Bill Perry had gone on to become the unofficial “site manager”, providing machinery and storage, and giving the plant an extra clean the day before the blessing ceremony.

Mrs Kerr said it was the latest in a long line of community projects the Perry’s had been involved in. “For decades you have both given generously of your time and efforts to help ensure the wellbeing of this very special community.”

The Waipātiki plant is the sixth small community drinking water facility to be fully upgraded, and the most complex. As well as UV disinfection and chlorination common to all of the facilities, it requires cartridge filtration as well as carbon and greensand filters to remove ammonia, iron and manganese.

“This large project ensures our small coastal and rural water supplies, like our urban areas, have a safe, resilient water supply with necessary capacity,” said Mrs Kerr.

The last small community facility, in Whakatū, is due to be completed before Christmas.

Mayor Sandra Hazlehurst said seeing all of the projects in the Hastings Drinking Water Strategy (2018) so near to completion was very exciting.

“It is going to be so wonderful to celebrate the completion of the last of the projects next year, after five years of very hard work and significant investment by our community.

“In 2018, when we prepared the Safe Drinking Water strategy in the wake of the Havelock North water crisis, we made a promise that safe drinking water would be our number one priority. We have never wavered from that and I am proud of what we have delivered. I want to acknowledge our councillors over those five years, some of whom have retired, for their foresight and commitment to invest in new quality water infrastructure.” 

The first of the major projects included the laying of a second water main between Hastings and Havelock North and a new pump station in Havelock North. Six new small community drinking water storage and treatment facilities have been completed in Waipātiki, Waimārama, Te Awanga/Haumoana, Whirinaki/Esk, Te Pōhue and Clive.

The construction of both new large urban facilities is well on the way. The Frimley storage and treatment plant is near completion and will next go through the commissioning phase, while the construction of the Waiaroha facility, started in 2021, will be completed next year.

19 October 2022

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