SUBANG JAYA, Sept 28 — The Selangor state government, through the Selangor Water Management Authority (Luas), will utilise drone technology to monitor water sources in the state other than using it to acquire water samples and receive warning signs of suspicious activities.
According to a news report by Sinar Harian on Saturday, the pilot project proves that the state administration is serious about preventing water source pollution, which includes the establishment of a Luas Speed Squad that carries out 24-hour surveillance across high-risk water source areas at the Sungai Selangor, Sungai Langat and Sungai Klang river basins.
Selangor State Public Amenities, Agricultural Modernisation and Agro-based Industry Committee chairman Izham Hashim said Luas, via the Op Sumber Air since last March, had prevented seven pollution incidents from taking place, which could potentially cause water treatment plants to cease operations that could lead to water disruption.
“However, one pollution incident in Sungai Gong was slow to be reported, which resulted in water disruption to 1.2 million account holders early this month,” said Izham Hashim during the launch of the state-level World Rivers Day 2020 Programme at Subang Jaya Riverfront on Saturday.
The Malay daily also reported that Izham Hashim said the state government is reviewing the move of giving incentives to whistleblowers who alert the authorities about activities that may cause (river) pollution so as to prevent the recurrence of such incident.
The Selangor government had also launched the Friends of River (FoR) programme to bring together communities to work together in protecting the rivers.
On September 10, Selangor Menteri Besar Dato’ Seri Amirudin Shari had said drone technology will be used to monitor the rivers to prevent unforeseen incidents that would pose a risk to the raw water sources.
Amirudin added that the technological inclusion would enable more frequent surveillance of Selangor’s two primary rivers, Sungai Selangor and Sungai Langat.
