Talas Municipal Water Authority

The Talas Municipal Water Authority (Iradi: Talas Shaarlyk Suu Bashkarmasy) is the public utility that supplies drinking water and runs the sewerage system of Talas. It serves the city's population of about 1.1 million and parts of the surrounding suburbs, and answers to the city administration, headed by a mayor appointed by the Governor, and to the elected city council. Most of its water is pumped from wellfields in the alluvial fan south of the city. The rest is drawn from the Talas River and treated at the Talas Municipal Water Treatment Works.^[1]

History

Talas received its first piped water supply in the 1930s, from springs and shallow wells in the foothills. The southern wellfields were developed in the 1960s and 1970s as the city grew, and the central sewage treatment plant was built in 1974.^[2] During the siege of Talas from April 1992, in the First Iradi Civil War, shelling and power cuts stopped the pumping stations and damaged the main from the southern wellfields. By late May much of the city had no piped water, and residents drew water from irrigation canals (aryk) and hand pumps. Supply was restored during the summer of 1992 by city crews working with US military engineers.^[3]

The authority was set up as a municipal utility in 1995, during the territorial period, taking over from the Soviet-era municipal waterworks. US federal grants and territorial bonds paid for new pumps and meters for commercial users, and the sewage plant was upgraded with biological treatment in the early 2000s.^[1] Since 2007 it has operated under the ISEZ municipal administration. In 2016 it installed a supervisory control and data acquisition (SCADA) system, supplied with Attelkom, to monitor pressure and detect leaks.

Water supply

The groundwater comes from aquifers recharged by snowmelt and glacier-fed streams descending from the Talas Alatau. The authority operates four wellfields in the alluvial fan, with 64 submersible pumps drawing from depths of 80 to 220 meters. The groundwater is of good quality and needs only chlorination. River water is treated by flocculation, sand filtration and ultraviolet disinfection at the treatment works.^[1] Two storage reservoirs on the foothill slopes south of the city feed the network by gravity. The network has about 540 km of mains, much of it Soviet-era steel and cast-iron pipe. The authority estimates that about 40 percent of the water it produces is lost to leaks or not billed.^[4]

The Talas River Hydrological Monitoring Service passes river-flow readings to the authority in real time. The authority and the Talas Basin Agricultural Directorate share the basin's water and coordinate withdrawals in dry summers.^[2]

Sewerage

The Talas Central Sewage Treatment Plant, on the western edge of the city, treats about 140,000 cubic meters of wastewater a day and discharges the treated effluent into the Talas River. The hydrological service monitors sewage indicators downstream of the city.^[2] Older suburbs and the new housing on the city's edges are not fully connected to the sewers and rely on septic tanks and pit latrines.

Tariffs and finance

Household tariffs are set in Iradi som by the city council, while commercial and industrial customers are billed in US dollars. Tariffs cover operating costs but not major repairs, which depend on allocations from the ISEZ budget. Proposed increases have been controversial, and the council postponed one in 2019 after public complaints.^[4]

References

1. ^ Talas Municipal Water Authority (2023). Annual Report 2022. Talas.
2. ^ Talas River Hydrological Monitoring Service (2023). Annual Hydrological Bulletin of the Talas Basin. Talas.
3. ^ Department of History, Talas State University (2017). The War of 1992: A Documentary History. Talas State University Press.
4. ^ Talas Herald (17 April 2019). 'Council shelves water tariff rise.' Talas.