«Our goal is the best water in Ukraine»: the head of the water utility about the new water supply and treatment plant for Mykolaiv

Boris Dudenko held a live broadcast on social media and answered questions from Mykolaiv residents. Photo: Mykolaivvodokanal

Boris Dudenko, Director of «Mykolaivvodokanal», hopes that the construction of the water supply system will be completed by the end of the summer and the city will receive good quality water from the taps.

Boris Dudenko said this during his live broadcast on social media today, 6 June, according to NikVesti.

As you know, the contractor reported the day before that the construction of a new water supply system in Mykolaiv was 90% complete.

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«When will we have normal drinking water? I would like to support the optimism that we will have good water in our homes by the end of the summer. We are constantly communicating with the contractor and resolving acute technical issues. The pace of construction is quite high. The contractor has experience, knows what to do, and has the resources, so we have quite good hope,» said Borys Dudenko.

He added that the problem of water supply in Mykolaiv will be finally resolved after the construction of the treatment plant. This will provide Mykolaiv residents with drinking water from the taps.

«But I want to say that in order for us to completely solve the issue of drinking water, we still need to build new water treatment facilities and a new filtering station. The mayor, Oleksandr Sienkevych, and the head of the RMA, Vitalii Kim, are constantly dealing with this issue at all levels. This includes international meetings and work with the central government. And I hope that we are already at the final stage of making a decision on the construction of new treatment facilities,» said Borys Dudenko.

He added that a modern filtration plant in line with international standards could make the water in Mykolaiv one of the best in the country.

«Our ambitious goal is a modern filtration plant in accordance with international standards, using modern new technology that works in many countries in Europe and America. Since Mykolaiv suffered the most during the war in terms of water supply, we have an ambitious goal to ensure that the water in Mykolaiv is the best in Ukraine,» said Borys Dudenko.

We remind you that about 70 million hryvnias is required to reconstruct the water treatment facilities of the water utility, which are needed to launch a new water supply system in Mykolaiv. When the new water supply system is launched in autumn 2025, the water in the taps of Mykolaiv residents will meet sanitary standards.

At the same time, it is known that the construction of new water treatment facilities in Mykolaiv was previously estimated at 132 million euros. However, the construction of the water supply system from Nova Odesa reduced the cost of these works by 2.5 times, as the water quality in that section of the Southern Bug is better than expected.

Water supply for Mykolaiv

Construction of a new water supply system for Mykolaiv, 22 May 2025, photo: Daryna Melnychuk, NikVesti

It has been more than three years 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 quality water. Currently, Mykolaiv residents receive water from a backup source, which raises many questions about the quality of this water and the salt content in it. The salt water damaged 1,200 kilometres of the city's water supply network. Borys 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.

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

The regional recovery service even 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 «Avtostrada». However, later both the client and the construction contractor were changed. The customer for the construction of the new water pipeline was the Service for Infrastructure Restoration and Development in Dnipropetrovska oblast, and the contractor was the group of companies «Avtostrada».

The future water pipeline for Mykolaiv is expected to be built and launched by autumn 2025, said Serhii Sukhomlyn, head of the State Agency for Reconstruction. Back during a conference in Berlin in 2024, First Deputy Speaker of the Verkhovna Rada Oleksandr Korniienko, answering a question from 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 programme.

Solar power plants are going to be installed on the water supply system for Mykolaiv, which will reduce the cost of water tariffs for the city's residents, said Vitalii Kim, head of the RMA. At the same time, the contractor «Autostrada» explained that they decided to lay a new water supply system for Mykolaiv from Nova Odesa, as it is the «closest site with good quality drinking water». They also showed photos of the construction of the new water supply system.

More treatment facilities are needed

Although a new water supply system for Mykolaiv is expected to be built by autumn 2025, this does not guarantee that the city will immediately receive drinking water, as a new water treatment system needs to be built, Kristina Mikulova, head of the European Investment Bank's Eastern Europe Regional Centre, told NikVesti.

At the same time, Deputy Mayor of Mykolaiv and head of the city's recovery working group Serhii Koreniev said that the Mykolaiv Recovery Agency is working to upgrade the wastewater treatment plant and launch it simultaneously with the new water supply system. And Vitalii Kim, head of the Mykolaiv Regional Water Authority, said he did not want to rush to take out a large loan for the construction of water treatment facilities for Mykolaiv, despite the EIB's readiness to allocate more than €100 million.

Later, it became known that the State Agency for the Restoration and Development of Infrastructure is currently upgrading the water treatment system for Mykolaiv on behalf of the government.

Together with the constructed water pipeline, this will allow the city to launch a centralised drinking water supply in August 2025, said Serhii Sukhomlyn, head of the State Agency for Infrastructure Recovery and Development.