Haya Water, a state-owned vehicle set up by Muscat Municipality, is overseeing the implementation of the mammoth project, billed as one of the biggest in the wider region.

Importantly, the Haya Water project will make available massive volumes of treated water for landscaping, farming and irrigation.  It will provide the farm sector with an alternative resource to depleting groundwater aquifers.

Affirming its determination to implement the giant project despite the global economic downturn, Oman’s government signed contracts worth in excess of half a billion dollars recently.

Those deals, totaling OR198 million ($515 million) in value, will pave the way for wastewater networks to be built in key neighbourhoods of the sprawling city, notably Seeb, Bausher, Darsait, Wadi Kabir, Hamriya and Eint.

In addition to the construction of several modern treatment plants, the contracts also cover the laying of hundreds of kilometres of sewer lines and several pumping stations, as well as the decommissioning of ageing treatment plants.

The contracts represent a significant chunk of the estimated OR1.3 billion investment that will be made by the government in the development of a world-class wastewater network for the capital region of the sultanate.

The scheme involves the construction of around 10 sewage treatment plants, dozens of pumping stations, and hundreds of kilometres o f vacuum sewers and gravity lines.

By 2014, more than 80 per cent of Muscat’s population will be covered by Haya Water’s modern wastewater scheme.

Coverage is expected to rise to 90 per cent by 2017. By 2035, some 200,000 connections will have been provided to stand-alone homes and buildings throughout the city.

Furthermore, the availability of huge quantities of treated water is also expected to significantly enhance Muscat’s verdant appeal as one of Arabia’s greenest cities. – TradeArabia News Service