State tourism, environment, green technology and indigenous affairs committee chairman Hee Loy Sian said this could expedite action to check on water resource contamination.
“The Selangor State Water Resource Pollution Emergency Committee meeting was held on Monday.
“I was told that the delay in action against the pollution that took place at the Indah Water Konsortium (IWK) sewage treatment plant in Taman Velox, Rawang, recently was due to poor coordination.
“I do not want to point fingers at any one but what I see is that communication between Pengurusan Air Selangor Sdn Bhd (Air Selangor), Lembaga Urus Air Selangor (LUAS), National Water Services Commission (SPAN), IWK and local authorities should be improved,” he told reporters here today.
This came about as a notice in the form of a letter from IWK on the water pollution incident was only received by the Selayang Municipal Council 10 days after the date of the incident.
“This happened despite the state government setting up a ‘WhatsApp Group Ops Sumber Air’ involving all top officers of the agencies involved.
“The WhatsApp group involved all top officers, including me.
“So if any river pollution occurs and is informed through this platform, we will be able to take action faster.
“However, I was told what happened in Taman Velox was not informed via this (WhatsApp) application.
“Therefore, I hope coordination between one another will be improved in future so that all incidents (of water resource pollution) are announced faster so that the issue can be resolved quickly,” he said.
On Nov 10, the Sungai Selangor water treatment plants at Rantau Panjang, as well as Phase 1, 2 and 3, were halted following pollution at the raw water intake point.
The source was believed to be a small and medium industry area in Taman Velox.
This caused an unscheduled water supply disruption involving 1,139,008 households and businesses in the Klang Valley.
Hee was told the operation at the Rantau Panjang treatment plant was stopped for almost two hours from 7.10pm yesterday after the detection of another incident of odour pollution measuring one TON (odour measurement) at the plant’s water intake.
He said the odour pollution was suspected to be due to drain water being washed away, together with chemical residues, during heavy rain into Sungai Gong and the water intake point.
Hee said the halt at the Rantau Panjang plant did not cause any water supply disruption to consumers. Operations resumed at 9.30pm after the problem was resolved.