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AGENCY TESTIMONY
Delaware Aqueduct repair work and drought management
0:14:15
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95 sec
Commissioner Aggarwala discusses the ongoing Delaware Aqueduct repair work, recent drought conditions, and their impact on water management strategies.
- The Delaware Aqueduct repair work was paused last year due to drought conditions.
- DEP is working to resume repairs this year, depending on weather conditions and reservoir levels.
- The city exited drought conditions in January, but current storage is still lower than usual for this time of year.
- DEP is updating its drought protocols, which haven't been revised in 25 years, to account for new technologies and communication methods.
- The department maintains a low rate of water main breaks (5-6 per 100 miles) compared to the national average (25 per 100 miles).
Rohit Aggarwala
0:14:15
We had as you well know expected to do the repair last year but had to pause because of the drought.
0:14:22
We are working to be able to resume that repair this year but doing so will depend on several factors including the weather.
0:14:28
While we exited drought conditions in January, the current storage is still lower than usual for this time of year.
0:14:35
We need absolutely full reservoirs in the Croton system in order to proceed with the repair again this October, so we are monitoring levels closely.
0:14:43
My colleagues deputy commissioners Paul Rush and Beth Defalco testified in December about the drought.
0:14:48
As they discussed, we learned a great deal from the experience and among other priorities this year, we are working to update our drought protocols.
0:14:56
Since our previous drought was in 02/2001, our protocols did not take into account much that has changed in twenty five years including automatic meter readers, our new billing system, and social media.
0:15:09
We will take our time with this but intend to update these before the end of the year.
0:15:14
We've done a very strong job of maintaining our in city distribution system of 7,000 miles of water mains.
0:15:20
We have one of the lowest rates of water main breaks in the country.
0:15:23
DEP has averaged between five and six breaks per hundred miles for the last several years, which is well below the national average of 25 breaks per hundred miles.
0:15:33
When breaks do occur, we work to fix the problems as quickly as possible.
0:15:37
In FY '24, on average we were able to restore service after a water main break in just over four hours.
0:15:45
Two topics I know to be of interest to the committee are lead service lines and sewer backups.