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PUBLIC WORKS AND UTILITIES
further pumping. By the end of September a total of 12,500 million gallons had been collected.
Several problems associated with the reservoir were successfully resolved. Removal of salt water fish was carried out with less diffi- culty than anticipated. Preliminary trial stocking with fresh water fish was begun. The dam itself was carried up to within 18 feet of its final level.
The main tunnel between Tai Po and Plover Cove, which feeds water into the reservoir from the hills above and from as far afield as the River Indus, and catchments stretching from Tai Po to Sha Tin, was completed just in time for the summer rains.
The River Indus yield, while non-existent during the driest periods of winter, can exceed 200 million gallons a day under summer flood flow conditions and a pumping station of this capacity was com- pleted on its banks. In view of the increased resources at Tai Po Tau a six-million-gallons-a-day treatment plant is being built with site provision for extension to 24 million gallons a day. This will provide treated water for the New Territories' townships of Tai Po and Sheung Shui.
So that these additional sources of water can be fed into the supply, large distribution mains have been laid in Kowloon and a new 42-inch cross-harbour main was laid to Hong Kong Island. Work progressed on two major service reservoirs in Kowloon to distribute water from the Sha Tin Treatment Works to the densely populated areas in the west and south of the peninsula.
The recommendations of a Water Resources Survey, which has been looking into future water needs of the Colony, were accepted and investigation began on two major reservoir projects. These were the raising of the Plover Cove dam and the development of the water resources of the Sai Kung Peninsula. The former could add 10,000 million gallons to the storage capacity there and is likely to prove cheap and quick. The continuing increase in demand for water means, however, that as well as looking for more reservoir capacity to balance out the widely fluctuating run-off, more catch- ment area is also required to increase the maintainable supply. Sai Kung Peninsula, the area of the second investigation, is the largest untapped catchment in the Colony, and offers several