ENG-2006 — Page 351

The Environment | 287

Water Quality and Sewerage

Water pollution has increased with urban development and population growth, and Hong Kong now produces about 2.8 million cubic metres of sewage every day. In the past, the lack of proper treatment for most of the sewage from older urban areas around Victoria Harbour resulted in poor water quality there but, after the first stage of the Harbour Area Treatment Scheme (HATS) opened at the end of 2001, there has been a marked improvement. The Government plans to implement the second stage of the scheme soon, to ensure that the improvement is sustained.

In addition, pollution control at source has yielded positive effects, and river quality has also improved. The percentage of rivers in the 'good' and 'excellent' categories increased from 34 per cent in 1986 to 81 per cent in 2006, and the percentage in the 'bad' and 'very bad' categories fell from 45 per cent in 1986 to 14 per cent in 2006.

Sewage Treatment and Disposal

At present, the public sewerage system covers 93 per cent of the population and collects about 2.6 million cubic metres of waste water every day. About 70 per cent of the collected sewage receives chemical or higher levels of treatment before being discharged.

During the first stage of the HATS, sewage was collected from the urban areas of Kowloon, Tsuen Wan, Kwai Tsing, Tseung Kwan O and the northeastern part of Hong Kong Island and transported through a network of deep tunnels to Stonecutters Island for treatment.

The Government intends to implement the second stage in two phases. The first phase (HATS Stage 2A) involves extending the deep tunnel system to bring the untreated sewage from the remaining parts of Hong Kong Island to the Stonecutters Island Sewage Treatment Works. The treatment works is to be expanded to provide centralised chemical treatment for all sewage from the whole of the HATS catchment with fast-track provision of disinfection. The target year for completion of this phase is 2014. Under the second phase (HATS Stage 2B), new biological treatment facilities on a site adjacent to the existing Stonecutters Island Sewage Treatment Works will be built. The timing for this depends on a review in 2010-11. Both phases, however, are subject to the legislature endorsing proposals for the recovery of operating costs through charges for sewage services, in accordance with the polluter pays principle.

More details of the HATS are available on the 'A Clean Harbour for Hong Kong' website, www.cleanharbour.gov.hk.

Apart from HATS, the Government has spent a further $14.5 billion on other sewerage schemes since 1991 and it will spend another $5 billion on schemes over the next five years. This includes sewerage for rural villages. Under the Water Pollution Control (Sewerage) Regulation, the EPD is empowered to direct house owners to connect their waste water pipes to new public sewers. In 2006, public sewers were laid to serve an estimated population of 5 200 people. Since the