Taipei Water Department

The "Feitsui Raw Water Supply Tunnel Project," which is crucial to the safety of water supply in the Greater Taipei area during the flood season, commenced construction on July 15, 2019. After four years of tireless effort and hard work by the construction team of the Taipei Water Department (TWD), the tunnel breakthrough was achieved today (12), reaching an important milestone in the project. After the completion of the project, if the raw water in Xindian River is too turbid, the Taipei Water Department can directly draw high-quality raw water from Feitsui Reservoir to ensure the stability and quality of the tap water supply. Mayor Chiang Wan-an of Taipei City has attached great importance to this major civil engineering construction project, and officiated at the opening ceremony of the tunnel today together with Executive Yuan Vice Premier Cheng Wen-tsan and New Taipei City Vice Mayor Chu Tih-ju.

According to the TWD, the "Feitsui Raw Water Supply Tunnel Project" relies on the full support and assistance of the Executive Yuan, the Water Resources Agency and the Government of New Taipei City, where the project is located. Mayor Chiang Wan-an also expressed his gratitude to the construction team for their hard work and especially to the "heroes of tunnel-boring," without whom the project would not have been tunneled through today, and the future water supply in the greater Taipei area would not be secure.

The TWD noted that in recent years, climate change, extreme weather storms and typhoons have caused the turbidity of raw water in the upstream of Xindian River to become a regular occurrence. In 2015, Typhoon Soudelor caused the mud and rocks to collapse in the Nanshi River as well as in the upper Xindian River, causing the turbidity of raw water to reach a record high. As a result, the water supply system in Greater Taipei was interrupted and people were left without water. In order to enhance water security, the TWD has promoted the Feitsui Raw Water Supply Tunnel Project. The tunnel is about 2.8 kilometers long, with an inner diameter of 4.5 meters and the water intake can reach 2.7 million tons per day. Due to safety considerations and to reduce the impact on the environment, the tunnel construction has abandoned the blasting and boring method, which is faster than the excavation method, and adopted the special method of mechanical boring. During the construction period, the construction team encountered difficulties such as geological variation, hard bedrocks, etc. The construction team adopted various auxiliary methods to ensure construction progress in a safe and steady manner, responding to the commitment to environmental protection through concrete actions.

After the breakthrough of the Feitsui Raw Water Supply Tunnel today (12), the concrete lining structure of the raw water tunnel and the water intake facilities of the river weir are to be constructed next, and the whole pipeline is scheduled to transport water by June 2024. In addition to improving water security for 6 million people in the Greater Taipei area, the second phase of the Banqiao-Xinzhuang Water Supply Improvement Project of the Water Resources Agency of the Ministry of Economic Affairs will expand the supply of water from Feitsui Reservoir to the Shulin, Yingge and Sanxia districts, increasing the proportion of water used in New Taipei City to 57%. This is in line with the Central Government's "Industrial Water Supply Stabilization Strategy" to jointly regulate water supply across regions, reducing the risk of water shortages and improving the resilience of water supply in Northern Taiwan.