Sabotage suspected in pollution which disrupts water supply in Selangor and KL

SHAH ALAM: Selangor is crying sabotage over the latest odour pollution in Sungai Selangor which forced the shutdown today of four water treatment plants supplying piped water to about 1,139,008 accounts in the state and Kuala Lumpur.

State Tourism, Environment, Green Technology and Orang Asli Affairs Committee chairman Hee Loy Sian said initial investigation found that the odour pollution, believed to be from solvent, originated from the Indah Water Konsortium (IWK) plant in Taman Velox, Rawang.

"I will visit the location as we detected that solvent was dumped either in a manhole or directly at the IWK plant," he said when winding up the debate on the Selangor Development Budget 2021 at the State Legislative Assembly here today.

Hee said this in response to a question from Elizabeth Wong Keat Ping (PH-Bukit Lanjan), who interrupted his winding-up speech to ask about the latest odour pollution, which occurred less than 24 hours after the amendment to the Lembaga Urus Air Selangor (LUAS) Enactment 1999 was approved by the state assembly yesterday.

The water treatment plants affected by the odour pollution are Rantau Panjang and Sungai Selangor Phases 1, 2 and 3.

Elaborating, Hee said inspections by LUAS and Pengurusan Air Selangor Sdn Bhd (Air Selangor) found no odour pollution in Sungai Gong and Sungai Sembah between 2 am and 7 am today.

"We think there must have been a sabotage, so we will lodge a police report and find the culprit behind this issue," he said.

Hee also did not rule out the possibility that the sabotage was carried out between 7 am and 10 am today, before the four water treatment plants were shut down at 12.45 pm.

Air Selangor has issued an alert for unscheduled water supply disruption from 6 pm today in 1,279 areas in Kuala Lumpur, Petaling, Klang, Shah Alam, Kuala Selangor, Hulu Selangor, Gombak and Hulu Langat following the incident.

This episode of water woes came less than a month after the same water treatment plants were forced to shut down last month, also due to odour pollution.

-- BERNAMA