DAVAO CITY—An Aboitiz subsidiary will begin constructing its water-treatment facility in a northern outskirts village here, described as the country’s largest bulk-water supply facility.
President Duterte was invited on Monday to mark the start of the construction of the facility in Barangay Gumalang in Baguio District. It would take three years to build at a cost of P12.6 billion.
The water-treatment facility has a production capacity of 300 million liters per day, more than its current production of 245 million liters,
It would tap the still pristine waters of the Tamugan River, which flows out from the Lipadas watershed area.
Apo Agua Infrastructura Inc., the Aboitiz subsidiary, is udertaking the project with the Davao City Water District (DCWD), which would also be constructing the water reservoir in five barangays along the water route of the river.
Ones C. Almario, general manager of Apo Agua, said the production capacity would be delivered to more than 1 million Davao City residents and may start to gradually begin supplying water by the first quarter of 2021.
He said the company has complied with the licensing and permitting requirement and about 92 percent of the right-of-way acquisition.
Lawyer Bernardo B. Delima Jr., water district spokesman, said the Apo Agua project would enable upland residents to access potable water not available to them at current DCWD operation.
The two project proponents said the initial operation of the bulk-water facility would prioritize the upland communities of the city’s District 2, such as the Buhangin and Cabantian areas, and up to to the interior communities going to the northeastern boundary barangays of Tibungco, Bunawan and Lasang.
Delima said it has laid the new pipes required by the higher-pressured delivery of the water and assured that all the other facilities such as the main water reservoir in the five barangays lying along the path of the Tamugan River would be finished before the 2021 timetable of the Apo Agua.
The Aboitiz group told Duterte the bulk-water facility would be “one of a kind in Asia.”
Sabin M. Aboitiz, president and CEO of Aboitiz InfraCapital, appealed to the barangays hosting the water reservoir and the major water-system facilities to protect the pipelines.