Water quality testing: three water points in Mykolaiv do not meet requirements

Free drinking water distribution points in Mykolaiv. Archive photo NikVesti

Three free drinking water distribution points that do not meet the hydrogen content requirements have been found in Mykolaiv.

This was reported by the Main Directorate of the State Food and Consumer Service in Mykolaiv region.

It is noted that six drinking water distribution points of the Ukrainian Red Cross Society were found in the central district of Mykolaiv, where there is no information that the water is suitable for drinking and safe for human health.

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Due to the lack of data on the safety of drinking water, 5 samples of drinking water were taken at the distribution points. According to the results, three samples do not meet the requirements for physical and chemical parameters (hydrogen index) with a norm of 6.5-9.0.

It is worth reminding that a new water supply system for Mykolaiv was promised to be built by autumn 2025. However, this does not guarantee that the city will immediately receive drinking water, as a new water treatment system needs to be built, the European Investment Bank said.

Construction of the new water supply system began in early 2025. The cost of the work was reduced from UAH 8.7 billion to UAH 5 billion. This became possible after a detailed analysis of the project, which revealed several planning errors.

Read also the article NikVesti «Three years without drinking water: what will the future water supply system look like for Mykolaiv?»

A water supply system for Mykolaiv

Almost three years have passed since Russian troops damaged the water supply pipeline that supplied Mykolaiv with water. Since then, the city of almost half a million people has been without a centralised supply of drinking water. Currently, Mykolaiv residents receive water from a backup source, which raises many questions about the quality of the water and the salt content.

The salt water damaged 1,200 kilometres of the city's water supply network. Boris Dudenko, director of «Mykolaivvodokanal», said that it is impossible to replace the entire length of the network that was damaged by salt water. As of August 2024, only about 3 kilometres of the network had been replaced.

Saltwater-damaged pipes stored at the company «Mykolaivvodokanal», August 2024, photo «NikVesti».

All this time, representatives of state and local authorities were looking for options to restore drinking water supply in Mykolaiv. The final solution was found in 2024: a new water supply system will be laid from Nova Odesa, and the money was allocated from the state budget.

The Regional Reconstruction Service has already selected contractors who will work according to the principle of «design-build». They are three companies, each of which is responsible for one of the three work areas: «Ukrtransmist», «Rostdorstroi» and «Motorway».

The future water supply system for Mykolaiv is expected to be built and launched by autumn 2025, said Serhii Sukhomlyn, head of the State Agency for Reconstruction.

However, the question of the new water supply system's design capacity remains unresolved: on the one hand, there is an opinion that water consumption in Mykolaiv has decreased, and therefore a new calculation needs to be made, and on the other hand, limiting the amount of water can directly affect the future development of the city and its industry.

Back during the conference in Berlin in 224, the First Deputy Speaker of the Verkhovna Rada, Oleksandr Korniienko, answering a question NikVesti, said that the lack of drinking water in Mykolaiv was one of the biggest problems in Ukraine that the state should solve in the near future.

And President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has ordered the construction of a new water supply system to provide Mykolaiv with drinking water «under the fast track option» — drinking water should be available by the summer of 2025. The government has already approved the relevant programme.