Air Selangor on track to achieve Asia ambition

KUALA LUMPUR: Pengurusan Air Selangor Sdn Bhd (Air Selangor) is on track to achieve its aspirations of being the leading water services provider in Asia by 2030.

The water operator would like to be part of a benchmark deemed a gold standard by a non-profit body called Leading Utilities of the World that’s established by the Global Water Leaders Group.

Air Selangor’s acting chief executive officer Abas Abdullah said some 75 water operators around the world have been admitted into the list including Singapore, Japan’s Kitakyushu Water Service, Hong Kong’s water department and the United Arab Emirates.

“We are on track in this journey, there are certain criterias to be met – 14 areas of innovation. We must submit at least three innovation areas – and we are confident that we will be able to get it.

“They are looking for continuity in improvement. It is not a ranked system, basically if we meet a certain set of criteria we will be part of the benchmark,” Abas told StarBiz on the sidelines of its Sustainability Report 2023 press conference yesterday.

“In fact, one can drink water from the taps (in Selangor) now, just allow the water from the tap to run for a while first.

“Despite having good water quality in Singapore and Japan for example, people there buy a lot of bottled water, well this is just a perception. It is a big challenge for operators to convince people on this front.

“We need to do a lot of engagements in terms of network, water quality and communications for example – we need to put more effort and are moving towards this,” he added.

Meanwhile, Abas said the water utility would also like to reduce its non-revenue water rate or NRW further, as about slightly more than a quarter of water consumed in the state isn’t paid for.

“Originally in 2016 it was at 33%, and fell to 27.8% in 2023 and we set a target to reduce it to 25% in 2030. This is one of our initiatives to adapt to climate change,” he said. Abas said Air Selangor is confident of meeting water demand from the various data centre newbuilds in the state.