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South West Water chief executive Susan Davy has refused to speculate on when the boil notice will be lifted for thousands of customers in Devon.
Davy said that despite the network being flushed 27 times it is still “going to take some time” before the boil notice is lifted.
Customers have been told to boil their water before consuming since 15 May when traces of cryptosporidium were detected.
The boil notice originally covered around 40,000 people but was reduced to around 2,000 households the following week after initial testing.
Davy said South West Water has been able to lift the notice for a further 55 customers in the past week, in a video update posted on Youtube.
“I want to thank customers for their patience. This is going to take some time as we make sure that we have cleared the network and we are back to a normal operating system,” Davy said.
“I have been asked when is this going to end and when are we going to lift the boil water notice? Well, we need to make sure that we are confident that we have returned the system to a normal steady state. We are not there yet, but we are making really good progress. And once we have got to that position, we will start lifting for customers.”
She added: “We’ve already lifted for 55 customers and we’re going to keep going in a phased way so that where we can lift, we will lift, but only when we are confident that we have returned the network to a steady state.”
South West Water has now confirmed that a damaged air valve casing on private land was the source of contamination.
That valve has now been removed and replaced and South West said it is carrying out an investigation to determine how it was damaged in the first place.
To rid its network of cryptosporidium, South West engineers have been carrying out various testing and cleaning procedures, including ice pigging, UV treatment and installing specialist microfilters (see graphic below).
In its annual accounts, South West parent company Pennon said it had set aside £3.5 million for compensation payments to affected customers.
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