It’s a “roll of the dice” when it comes to the lack of backup power for Naramata’s drinking water infrastructure.
Without a backup generator, whenever the Naramata area loses power, water can no longer be pumped from the lake and through the treatment plant into the reservoirs.
With agricultural water users in the area, the reservoirs can dry up quickly if that scenario takes place in the hot summer months.
There are alternatives in that scenario as far as drinking water is concerned, but the roll of the dice comes in if there is a fire during one of these outages.
“The concern is if there is an interface fire or even house fires that start, we may not be able to fight them,” said Karla Kozakevich, Naramata’s director on the Regional District Okanagan Similkameen board.
Kozakevich said the situation nearly came to a head two years ago when there was a power outage in July and the supplies were essentially depleted. Fortunately, the power came back on just before the water supplies were tapped.
Last year, an engineering firm drafted an estimate of the cost of the backup generator and there have been two public meetings held so far to gauge the public’s response to paying for a backup generator to avoid the worst-case scenario.
There is currently an online survey residents are encouraged to fill out at survey.rdos.abcweblink.ca. The survey closes April 3.
“That should give us a good feel as to whether they would like us to spend the money on it or not,” Kozakevich said.
There are different payment options and those who respond to the survey can select which they think is best suited to pay for the back up generator. Either through reserve funds, borrowed funds or grant money. Though there are some relevant grant applications that can be made, Kozakevich said there is not enough for the entire project.
“It would be some grant money with reserves or grant money and borrowing,” Kozakevich said.
So far the response from the majority has been in favour of the backup generator.
“At the last public meeting there was a very high majority in favour, and so far the survey we’re at approximately 85 per cent in favour,” Kozakevich said.
Once the survey is completed the Narmata Water Advisory Committee will review the results and make a decision to proceed with the installation or not.
If enough residents are in favour the next step will be to get bids on the project.
