Plans to tackle holiday island’s water shortage
Many houses on Cape Clear were restricted to just a few hours supply during the summer because of the drain on the island’s water resources. At a meeting of Cork County Council yesterday, senior executive engineer Niall O’Mahony told public representatives that average daily water demand on the island had increased by nearly a third in the last three years and he acknowledged there had been supply difficulties over the summer, exacerbated by tourists.
He outlined his proposals to councillors after Cllr Joe Carroll (FF) said steps had to be taken to augment the supply as soon as possible, because a large number of people had been inconvenienced, especially those living on higher ground.
Cllr Paddy Sheehan (FG) said to his knowledge a number of bore wells had been drilled in recent years and wanted to know if there was a problem with them.
His party colleague, Cllr Tadhg O’Donovan, said most islanders were living off tourism and anything that would damage that income had to be addressed.
Mr O’Mahony said that six bore holes had been drilled on Cape Clear and that while some provided good yields, others didn’t.
He said that a major scheme was needed to upgrade water supply to the island and that he was hoping by next spring the Department of the Environment would appoint a consultant to take the project on board.
“Desalination is an option but it is quite an expensive process. We could also run a pipe over from Sherkin
Island,” Mr O’Mahony said.
He added that building reservoirs to catch the abundant rainfall in winter months was another option. In the meantime the council is hoping to drill more bore wells to alleviate the problem, but Mr O’Mahony stressed that a major scheme was the long-term solution.
“We have prepared a brief which is with the department to upgrade the scheme and we will try and do minor works to keep it going until that scheme kicks in,” the engineer said.
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