IN a county such as Donegal, the last thing you’d expect is for people to be praying for rain, but Peadar MacRory said that if they aren’t already, they should start thinking about it.

Although this month is likely to be the wettest May on record, the chief engineer for water services is predicting shortages in the county, with Letterkenny being most at risk.

“It sounds bizarre to be hoping it rains in Donegal of all places,” MacRory agreed. “But we are worried that if June, July and August are dry we will have problems.

“We are trying to get people to conserve water, running ads in the newspapers and on the radio. But we can’t keep this up because they’ll ignore us, especially if it’s lashing down outside their windows.”

Any slight drop in the levels of lakes and rivers can cause shortages in Donegal, and this year isn’t looking good. “We have had about 348mm of rain so far,” complained MacRory. “It should have been 381mm. This time last year it was 433.

“We have a large number of water schemes operating from tight supplies. These have come under pressure in recent years due to increased usage, so we’re left exposed if things don’t go our way. This has led to water being switched off during off-peak times in places.”

MacRory reckoned Letterkenny would be experiencing severe shortages if it weren’t for the fact it lost two top employers recently. People in the area were devastated when Fruit of the Loom, a garment producer, and Unifi, a textile manufacturer, closed with the loss of hundreds of jobs. Both, however, were heavy users of water, and if they were still there and expanding, as everyone including MacRory would have wished, the supply of water in the town would not be meeting demand.

About 500 new properties a year are built in Letterkenny, and from January 2005 to April 2006 the average daily demand for water increased from 7.9m litres a day to 8.7m.

Elsewhere in the county there are projects underway to increase water production, but they are beset with planning delays and old infrastructure, leaving MacRory still counting the millimetres.

He is not the only local authority official hoping for rain this summer. In fact every council in Ireland is reviewing its water situation. None more so than Dublin, which is currently looking as far west as the Shannon to help supply the 700m litres a day it will need by 2031. The capital currently delivers 520m a day, but daily demand is growing by about 10m litres each year.

In parts of Kerry, some guests in B&Bs have complained they can’t shower at night because the pressure is so low, and farmers have been left without water for cattle. Planning applications for private houses have been rejected in Killorglin because of insufficient supplies.

There is water, water everywhere in Ireland, so why isn’t there enough to drink? And with supplies stretched, and new housing estates still popping up like pimples on the landscape, isn’t it time homeowners were forced to understand the cost of what they use?

“PLUG the sink and save litres of water,” the residents of north Dublin will be told next week. “A running garden hose uses 9 litres of water a minute. Use a watering can instead. A running tap uses up to 6 litres of water a minute.”

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