Remember Sisyphus of Greek mythology? His task in Hades being to forever push a rock uphill that immediately rolled downhill again. His name became associated with the embodiment of endless, futile tasks.

I think the task of the National Water Commission has many similarities to Sisyphus’. In many places the NWC pushes (pumps) water uphill, 24 hours per day, seven days per week, 365 1/4 days per year with electricity from the Jamaica Public Service Company generated by expensive imported oil.

A thankless task. Cursed when it does not reach the parched customer. Bullied by politicians into adding more pumped water supply systems to supply their constituents. Pumping water through old pipes, having more in common with sieves. Having pipes being endlessly bored into by thieves who extract the treated water forcing them to ask for rate increases not likely to be granted, and so on, endlessly.

This pushing of water uphill a couple of years ago reportedly cost roughly $3 billion per year (or $260 million per month). The NWC’s Charles Buchanan has said the appropriate things: that they’re trying to store water high up on slopes, tried to get discounts from JPSCo, etc.

Now, think about it this way, the rain falls, it runs downhill, it is collected, treated and pushed back uphill: neat, eh? NWC pumps multi-multi-megatons of water uphill every day.

There is a thing called “least cost expansion”. This is what is often used to decide what to install next. As it says, at the least (supposedly overall) cost. In the long run, and water systems are generally really long-term things, what is prudent or wise to do, is not necessarily what is going to fit into the least overall cost.

We should consider the wider picture, as well as the local picture.

The global picture says oil is becoming more and more expensive. Sure there will be a few ups and downs, but the price of oil will generally increase, sometimes really fast as we have seen in the past years. Who would have planned for more than a US$100 per barrel price for oil a few years ago? Now, it’s been there, and it will go there again and stay. It also makes global warming worse. Plans to burn coal to make cheaper electricity in the short term will make things even worse. The international oil company, Total, has said that without considerable investment now, oil shortages will occur by 2015 and the price of oil may again return to the US$100/barrel (BBC, September 20, 2009).

Consider this, NWC is JPSCo’s largest single customer, and, within the NWC, Manchester uses the most as a region. Let’s look a little closer at the Mandeville area. It’s on top of a high plateau, and when it rains heavily, there’s flooding. There are sinkholes on the plateau where water drains away. Where does Mandeville get its water from? The wells at Pepper and Porus at the foot of the plateau. Then, it’s pushed up the hill with electrical pumps.

So, where does the water at the foot of the plateau come from? Since it’s fresh water, I know it’s not coming from the lowlands or sea to the south. Could it be percolating through the rocks and running down the slopes into the aquifer for the NWC to pump back uphill? Holy Sisyphus!

Let’s step back a moment and consider a few obvious things staring us in the face. Talk about missing the obvious. Not seeing the forest for the trees.

* It rains in Manchester much like the rest of Jamaica.

* The water that’s being pumped uphill is coming out of aquifers at the bottom of the Manchester plateau, and there are sinkholes on top. Odd, isn’t it?

* It’s hard and expensive to store electricity, but it’s easy to store water.

* Bauxite has been dug out of open pit mines on the plateau, and there are still big holes in the ground there.

* The Wigton Wind Farm, a little to the southwest with its two dozen windmills making electricity, is just around the corner.

* Jamaica has a lot of sunshine.

* Water on top of a hill has more energy than water at the bottom.

Wait a minute! Can all of these things be put together to form some kind of solution?

What could we do to get water to the people on the plateau?

First, we must get away from the narrow foci typical of institutions and governments. NWC is concerned with water, and complains about the cost of electricity. JPSCo is concerned with electricity and complains about the cost of oil. The bauxite/alumina companies are concerned about, what else? Bauxite. The government is weeping and wailing about finding the foreign exchange to pay Jamaica’s oil bill.

Let’s try this

First, grab the water before it falls to the bottom of the hill, store it – you’ve got some big holes in the ground left over from the mining, maybe you should make some reservoirs out of them by lining them – treat it, pump it a wee bit and drink it. Simple? Eh?

If you’re still short, pump the shortfall from the same old places, Porus and Pepper.

Now, where on earth are you going to get the electricity to run the pumps and other systems you still have to use, and not mess up the Earth?

How about windmills or photovoltaic panels to make electricity? There are the usual problems; no wind or low wind, and cloudy days when photovoltaic panels won’t make electricity; and of course, it’s prohibitively expensive to store electricity. However, you can store water (interesting thought).

So what to do?

If you were to do the following, it might be a good long-term solution, but probably not a “least-cost” solution. Shut your eyes and stick your hand deep into your pockets. It’s going to cost a bit.

Remember the new lot of reservoirs on the plateau we just made by using the mined-out bauxite pits. Make sure there’s enough storage to keep you satisfied for a few days. Say, five days. Install some more pumping capacity to be able to pump more than the entire water demand for a day in the daytime (you’ll see why shortly).

Install enough additional windmills to produce enough power at the moderately low wind speeds of the slowest time of year to supply all of your electrical needs throughout most of the year. Sell the excess produced to the grid.

Install enough photovoltaic panels to be able to pump more than the entire water demand for a day in the daytime when the sunlight is bright enough.

When the wind is good, sell the excess wind-generated electricity to the grid, and all of the electricity from the photovoltaic systems, and build up a reserve buffer of water in the reservoirs. Build up a money reserve as well to maintain and operate the systems, and put away some for windless, cloudy days.

When the wind is poor, but it’s sunny, use the electricity from the photovoltaic systems to do the same and sell the little you get from the windmills to the grid and put away some for windless, cloudy days.

For the few times when there are windless, cloudy days, use whatever energy you can generate to move the reserves from the reservoirs, and if there is the unlikely situation when there is an extended period (heaven forbid) of no wind or sun, and you have run down your reservoirs, buy some power from the grid with your money reserves.

Oh, by the way, this reduces the amount of oil we have to import. Maybe we could even get some carbon credits which some people think are like money in the bank. Other people think the oil supply has peaked and is now in decline, and that as a consequence the cost per barrel of oil is only going to increase as time goes by.

Can we afford this? Can we not afford to do something like this? Do it gradually? Check it out! It might work, just like the Air Jamaica synthesis printed in the Observer newspaper on Ash Wednesday might.

Maybe you could think of it as a vaccination against oil. It’s really going to hurt now, but, you’ll be immune to oil (prices) later.

Howard Chin is a member of the Jamaica Institution of Engineers.

hmc14@cwjamaica.com