Our Articles

Informative Article

(606 words)

When recycled water is mentioned, the first thing that comes to your mind would be Singapore’s highly treated reclaimed wastewater, NEWater. Everyone knows of Water Wally – the cute, blue raindrop mascot that represents PUB (Public Utilities Board) and water conservation. NEWater aims to relay messages of water conservation and water usage to the general public. Many people have the impression that NEWater is “recycled urine water”, but it is in fact recycled water that is filtered through many, many layers and processes, and produces clean, purified and sustained water.  

Started by Keppel Seghers, environmental technology arm of Keppel Corporation, this master plan of recycling water went way back in the 1972s, with the plan to use desalinations as an alternative to reduce our reliance on getting our water from Malaysia and get a feasible source of raw water. However, this plan did not go through up until 2003. Due to the long-time friction between Singapore and Malaysia, Singapore was always finding ways to break out of that dependency on Malaysia. They are bound by treaty to sell us water up till only 2061.

When introduced into the public in 2003 by PUB, many people had the misconception that NEWater contains negative substances such as sewage water, used water or wastewater. Therefore, NEWater had to be cautious in addressing their processes and treatments. With the intention of the general public to look at NEWater in a more positive light and accept the idea of reused water, they had to rename their sewage treatment plants ‘water reclamation plants’ in hopes of the public looking at NEWater more optimistically.

Not many people understand how NEWater water treatments and processes work. They go through multiple stages of water reclamation processes before they package it into drinkable, portable bottles of water for the public consumption. The first stage of microfiltration is mainly to get rid of colloidal particles and solids including bacteria that causes diseases. This process allows the water to be filtered such that only dissolved salts and organic molecules pass through this first step of filtration. After the second stage of reverse osmosis to clean out the water thoroughly, the third step of filtration is meant to be a safety precaution where they use UV to disinfect the already filtered water, to ensure that all organisms and particles are removed, and the cleanliness and purity of water is secured. This would result in NEWater producing extremely clean, first grade retrieved water, curbing Singapore’s extremely hot weather and achieving our goal of water sustainability.

As of 2020, NEWater is mostly used for industrial and air-con cooling purposes at wafer fabrication plants, industrial areas and commercial buildings. The water currently produced are of quality even stricter than that of drinking water and is delivered to the industrial customers through a specific pipe network. The current workers at PUB, NEWater agree that it is a good working environment to work at and it is a family-oriented organization that provides training and upskill opportunities, therefore achieving NEWater’s goal of making the workplace a work-life balanced and stable environment to grow in.

The goal of NEWater is to allow independency of our water sources, so that we could sustain this country on our own. It is also important to ensure that demand for water does not rise at an unsustainable rate, and everyone has a part to play in managing the impact water has on the environment. Currently Singapore’s success story and our main pillar of water sustainability, NEWater may not have the means to produce enough purified water to be independent but is aiming to reach 55% of Singapore’s water demand by 2060.