The Asian Development Bank (ADB) has approved an investment loan for the Bigte-Novaliches Aqueduct 7 (BNAQ-7) project, the Metropolitan Waterworks and Sewerage System (MWSS) announced on Tuesday.
The project, once completed, is expected to boost the operational capacity of the MWSS to service the growing number of water consumers in Metro Manila and nearby towns and cities in the Greater Manila Area (GMA), such as Cavite and Rizal provinces.
“The approval of the loan is a testament to BNAQ-7’s, or AQ # 7, importance, scale, impact, and confidence to MWSS’s project execution performance,” the MWSS said.
The $126.02-million loan for AQ 7 is a separate loan from ADB, as part of the expanded Angat Water Transmission Improvement Project (AWTIP), to be constructed after the operationalization of the new Tunnel 4, also an ADB-financed project.
Tunnel 4 was partly operationalized during the period of enhanced community quarantine and is currently in the final stages of completion. It will be fully operational by July.
Once completed, the new aqueduct will have a capacity of 1,500 million liters per day and will replace the old and leaking Aqueduct Nos. 1 and 2, which can only deliver 300 MLD.
According to the MWSS, the higher design capacity provides substantial safety factor to the water security of Metro Manila and the flexibility in repairing other aqueduct systems.
“This will ensure that the water releases from the Umiray-Angat-Ipo system will flow to the different treatment plants of the MWSS’s concessionaires. MWSS is proud to have ADB to be its partner again for AQ 7,” the MWSS said.
The ADB has financed several reliability projects for the improvement of the MWSS’s conveyance systems, such as the Angat Water Supply Optimization Project, the Manila South Water Distribution Project, the Umiray-Angat Transbasin Project, and the ongoing AWTIP.