Part of Question for Urgent Oral Answer — Infrastructure – in the Northern Ireland Assembly at 3:45 pm on 16 September 2024.
John O'Dowd
Sinn Féin
3:45,
16 September 2024
I suspect that it will depend on the weather. I understand that we are in for a number of mild days. Mild weather encourages algae blooms in the lough, which last for a period of time. That means that we have to deal with that when we take water out of the lough through our water treatment works. I cannot give you a timescale. A reduction in temperature and, unfortunately, some rain and wind are required to break up the algae blooms. That will allow us to move ahead and take water out of the lough without such an input of algae blooms. We will, however, come back to this next year and in the years after that. Even fully committing, as I do, to the action plan published by the Agriculture, Environment and Rural Affairs Minister, we are involved in a long-term challenge here. We all have to recognise that. As I said, it might be a timely reminder to us all that we cannot take Lough Neagh for granted.
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