Renovation of the first phase of a water supply system from Minab Dam to Bandar Abbas in southern Hormozgan Province was completed on Tuesday.
"Preventing wastage of treated water at Minab Treatment Plant and reducing water loss along the route to the major port city are among our main goals," managing director of Hormozgan Regional Water Company Houshang Mollaee said.
Completed in two years at a cost of $7.3 million, work included replacing 16 kilometers of old concrete pipes with steel pipes, Mehr News Agency reported.
“The water pipeline from Minab to Bandar Abbas stretching over 85km was laid more than 40 years ago,” Mollaee said. In recent years the old concrete pipes had problems (cracks and leaks) resulting in water outage in Bandar Abbas, Bandar Khamir and the surrounding villages.
The faulty pipes also led to the loss of massive amounts of costly potable water. Work on the remaining part of the old pipeline is underway.
A hydroelectric dam located on Minab River, Minad Dam is the main supplier of water to Bandar Abbas off the coast of the Persian Gulf, which is home to 580,000 people.
Due to decades of drought, Hormozgan Province in general and Bandar Abbas in particular, has problems with water supply like many other parts of the country.
To tackle the extended water crisis, the state water authority in the province has built several desalination plants to produce potable water from sea water.
