Welsh Water Invests Record £1.7 billion

Dŵr Cymru, Wales' water utility, confirms record £1.7 billion investment after strong performance in 2014-15

The company has reported an underlying profit of £77 million which, as it has no shareholders, will all be reinvested in the business for the future benefit of customers and the environment. The performance reflects the efficient way the company is managing costs while continuing to improve services to customers. This includes delivering its best ever environmental performance thanks to investment at its wastewater treatment works and sewer network. These play an essential role in protecting the environment and improving bathing water quality and the investment helped Wales secure 34 Blue Flags. It also helped Wales' first designated freshwater bathing lake - Llyn Padarn near Llanberis - secure ‘excellent' water quality.

The company'sPreliminary Financial Results, announced today, also reflect how the company is embedding new, innovative approaches to improve further customer service and environmental performance. These include:

• introducing a new and innovative social tariff, calledHelpU, which will benefit up to 100,000 customers. This in turn will help lower levels of bad debt for the company and ensure we continue to provide more help to customers struggling to pay than any other water company in the sector.
• the successful roll-out of its urban drainage scheme,RainScape, in Llanelli and Gowerton which offers an innovative and sustainable solution to tackle urban flooding. The company has already invested £15 million in the scheme and a further £60 million has been allocated for similar schemes around Wales between now and 2020.
• work to improve water catchment management to reduce the amount of grassland herbicides entering water sourced for drinking water purposes. Water with herbicide remnants requires additional treatment which can be costly. More than 100 farmers have already signed up to help Welsh Water as part of the company'sWeed Wiperinitiative.
• developing a new ‘smart network'. This will help the company to predict more accurately where blockages and bursts might occur on networks, and so reduce the likelihood - and associated cost - of this happening.
• continuing to strengthen the resilience of its drinking water network which will include investing around £30 million in Bryn Cowlyd Water Treatment Works near Dolgarrog, which serves Llandudno, Colwyn Bay and the surrounding area.

The company's performance over the year, combined with its move to embrace innovative solutions, places it in a strong position to meet the challenging efficiency targets set by the regulator Ofwat for 2015-2020. During this time the company is to achieve efficiencies of around 20% to ensure it delivers record investment levels of £1.7 billion while maintaining below-inflation price increases every year up to 2020.

Glas Cymru Chairman, Bob Ayling said: "This has been another good year for Dŵr Cymru Welsh Water. We have improved our operational performance again; maintained very high levels of customer satisfaction; achieved excellent financial results allowing for record investment; and for the sixth successive year kept prices below inflation. But we are still not satisfied and now aspire to become a truly customer-led water and sewerage company."

Welsh Water's Chief Executive Chris Jones said: "This is our most ambitious investment programme to date and reflects our commitment to ensure customers can have complete confidence in our essential services. Our programme drives further innovation, learning from international best practice.

"While delivering our record investment programme, we are aware of the difficulties some of our customers genuinely face in paying their bills. That is why we have launched a new social tariff which will help up to 100,000 of our most disadvantaged customers.

"With the continued commitment of our colleagues, and our increased focus on innovation, I am confident that we will rise to the challenge so that we can continue to deliver industry-leading levels of financial, operational and environmental performance which are crucial to ensuring that we realise our vision of earning the trust of our customers every day."

Source: DwrCymru

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• Water Utility
• Water Management
• Alternative Investments