The presentation considers the life-cycle costing issues that arise during the rehabilitation of the Dam and provides recommendations on how they could be properly considered through various phases of the project’s life cycle.

1. February
Analysis of life-cycle
costs
The Roseau Dam infrastructure, Saint Lucia
2022

2. Context
• Climate change models have predicted that St.
Lucia will undergo a warming and drying trend and
is expected to endure more frequent heat waves
and droughts, rainfalls with increased intensity,
and rising sea levels as predicted for the rest of the
Caribbean consistent with the projected global
median. Probable climate change impacts in St.
Lucia include higher temperatures, higher storm
intensities and, possibly, more frequent El Niño-
Southern Oscillation (ENSO) events, exacerbating
existing health, social and economic challenges
affecting St. Lucia. (ref. WB Global Facility for
Disaster Reduction and Recovery GFDRR Country
Notes – Saint Lucia)
2

3. Roseau Dam
• Construction on the dam began in April 1993
but was substantially delayed when Tropical
Storm Debby struck the island on 10 September
1994. Rainfall from the storm exceeded the
1000 - year estimate and ensuing floods
breached the incomplete dam. The dam was
eventually completed in October 1995 and
commissioned in 1996. The dam's reservoir,
Roseau Reservoir, is experiencing heavily
siltation and studies are currently underway to
remediate the problem. Hurricane Tomas in
2010 and a severe December 2013 storm
created large landslides in the reservoir that
have reduced its capacity by at least 30 percent.
(https://en.wikipedia.org/?curid=48936020)
3

4. Location
4

5. Dam rehabilitation
St. Lucia ‘The Voice’ newspaper
• The dam rehabilitation
project is aimed at increasing
Saint Lucia’s water collection,
storage and distribution
capacity.
ADD A FOOTER 5

6. Phases 1 and 2 of Dam Infras.
Project
• Phase one of the project saw the
construction of a sediment disposal area
including reforestation and stabilisation of
60 ha of land in one year and 98ha in the
second year in order to reduce land
siltation (building of disposal pit) and soil
erosion at the dam site. It was funded
exclusively by the State-owned Water and
Sewerage Company (WASCO) from a
drenching fee introduced in 2012. The fee
was part of consumers’ bills, and has
accumulated to approximately EC$25.95
million dollars.
• The second phase of the project includes
the installation of pipes and the removal of
sediment, thus expanding the water
treatment plant from 0.4 m gallons to 1.4
m gallons per day, in order to increase the
water supply and quality to residents. That
phase will be financed through a loan
secured from the Caribbean Development
Bank. The overall cost of the project now
stands at EC$54 million (Ministry of
Infrastructure website). Currently, this
second phase of the project was awarded
to Vinci Construction Maritime et Fruvial
via international competitive bidding in
July 2018 and was followed by a “no
objection” from the Caribbean
Development Bank (CDB) and dredging
commenced in early October 2020 and is
ongoing.
6

7. Sectoral Adaptation
Plan
• The timely Saint Lucia 10-year Sectoral Adaptation Plan for
Water was developed in 2017, just before the second phase
of the project. It consists of 70 adaptation measures deemed
critical for improving water infrastructure and service
management and reducing water-mediated climate change
impacts in the country. The measures, endorsed by relevant
stakeholders, offer solutions to information, technical,
institutional, financial, regulatory and policy limitations
hampering adaptation in the water sector. These guide the
goals of, inter alia, increased water access, availability
and quality; water efficiency and conservation;
Strengthened preparedness to climate variability and
extremes. This allows them to follow the Quality
Infrastructure Investment (QII) Principles along the life-cycle
of the projects. 7

8. Life-cycle costing issues
• Non-revenue water loss at a high of 42% - 60%
• High involvement of State-owned stakeholder who does the price-
making.
• Increase in water tariffs for consumer; though outages and
shortages are common.
• No control over weather patterns causing, as we have seen, severe
damage and high costs for repair, operation and maintenance.
• Mitigation and adaptation become an ever-moving goal post and
uncertainty of climate change makes it almost impossible to
predict the damage, scale and effects of the damage. What is clear
is that they will impact water supply for 100 000 people and
reduce water quality and infrastructure reliability.
• Lack of local technical capacity to respond to major threats and
potential damage, therefore seeking international expertise,
bringing them into the country in a time of a health pandemic, and
training of local staff to continue the highly technical work, all
become an additional costs to the project.
• Seismic hazards: The seismic hazard at the site of
the dam in Saint Lucia is evaluated probabilistically
for engineering design purposes. The assessment
takes advantage of recent high quality regional
seismological data, reappraised older instrumental
catalogues and current tectonic interpretations.
Saint Lucia stands at a position in the Lesser Antilles
island arc where two distinct, seismically active,
subduction zones appear to converge at different
depths. As a result, the seismic hazard is critically
dependent on site position relative to the
boundaries of these major source zones, which each
exhibit different activity rates. The ground motion
hazard at the damsite is computed using the
probabilistic logic-tree program PRISK (ref. Lancaster
University research directory)
8

9. Recommendations
- Pursue collaboration with international agencies such as the
UN Office for Project Services and universities such as
University of Oxford-led Infrastructure Transitions Research
Consortium (ITRC) to facilitate evidence-based decision
making, while also aligning recommendations with the Paris
Agreement and the SDGs and the Paris Agreement on
Climate Change. The first such joint approach resulted in a
National Infrastructure Assessment completed in 2020. They
developed a National Infrastructure Systems Model
(NISMOD) composed of a series of analysis steps, which has
been designed to assess a country’s current and future
infrastructure needs and to provide recommendations on
how those needs can best be met (ref. National
Infrastructure Assessment Report). Though this
comprehensive model analysis was developed after the dam
was built, it can assist in recalibrating and adapting the dam
infrastructure project so that it reduces costs during the
second phase of the project, and also maintenance costs
and any other costs to the community, including resulting in
lower tariffs/ user fees.
9

10. Recommendations
- It is not clear whether the life cycle costing approach
was used in procurement process for the maintenance of
the dam. The documents for bidding and bid evaluation
are not always publicly available as the government may
have considered that relevant expertise is not available
in-country. However, the cross-departmental input
approach used to develop the terms of reference is one
way to ensure that quality and value for money is being
considered in the bidding process. Transparency in
procurement is essential.
- Evidence-based planning for climate-compatible
investment and development, facilitated by the
cooperation of numerous different ministries and
departments, can help Saint Lucia apply and benefit
from global adaptation funds to ensure long-term
sustainable growth.
- Building institutional capacity is also essential
for risk management and cost effectiveness:
Institutional capacity is pivotal to ensuring asset
management before, during, and after a
hazard. This includes the ability to use hazard
exposure modelling to inform decisions,
incorporate early warning systems, and to
develop emergency and evacuation plans.
- Resilient design of infrastructure maintenance
systems: Changing the design of infrastructure
supply can provide a relatively inexpensive and
adaptive way to adapt to erosion.
10

11. Recommendations
- Climate change has and will amplify existing
hazards, and have damaging effects on the dam as
it is in an exposed area (see photos). Disruptions to
basic infrastructure services (outages, reduced
water supply, silted water and reduced quality)
may have cascading socio-economic
consequences, particularly for the surrounding
communities, for hygiene, disease transmission,
education, or community services. Nature-based
solutions such as replanting of vegetation and
protection of the reservoir basin are a requirement
to prevent or limit future siltation related to
natural hazards such as erosion. Revegetating is a
simple, cost-effective, and community-based risk-
reduction solution.
- Private investment mobilisation can also be
considered, as mainly institution financial
mechanisms has been used thus far. Investors can
recuperate funds from affordable tariffs that may
be set once the water service is provided on a
more regular basis to an increasing consumer base
in a more reliable manner.
- Performance-based contracts could be considered
where remuneration is based on performance,
rather than long-term contacts that the
administration in Saint Lucia is accustomed to, as
the private party will then bear a significant
amount of risk and management responsibility,
which is currently mainly in the hand of the
national Water authorities.
11

12. Recommendations
- Seek ways to maximise the positive impact of the
infrastructure on communities, such as promoting
sustainable development , and community involvement
in observing and reporting damage to the dam and
reforestation awareness.
- Pursue predictive maintenance or preventative measures
as far as possible, based on optimal timing of events so
that the actors are not merely reactive when disaster
strikes, and this will contribute to reduced costs and
possibly its extended life as well as increased reliability.
- Greater effort is required in terms of safety and security
to further boost the production quality and capacity of
the dam, in light of an increasing population as well as
increasing usage by increased tourist arrivals. Smarter
technology may be utilised to model the dam and
observe virtual risks that may arise and that may hamper
operation and maintenance.
- Regulation on the safety and security of
surrounding terrain must also be included in the
maintenance of the dam as it remains accessible
to wandering members of the public and may cost
lives because of exposed high voltage wires.
- Resilience of the dam must also be clearly
addressed as such capacity building including
engineers within the water authority’s staff …
- It is necessary to design and put in place a
monitoring plan for the implementation of the
Water Adaptation Plan itself and for the dam
infrastructure, to ensure that the activities
conducted are completed and contribute to the
achievement of the established objectives and
outcomes. The monitoring and evaluation (M&E)
plan will also help to determine corrective actions
when changes, due to existing and new
circumstances occur, and will ease reporting.
12

13. Recommendations
- The dam could be used to produce hydroelectricity,
and though the cost may be high at initial stages, it
has potential to contribute further to carbon dioxide
reduction and reduce the use of GHGs on the Island
as well as reduce overall cost of energy. Energy
consumption and pollution can be limited by the use
of solar energy along the dam site.
- Regional integration in infrastructure
management (on the operation and
maintenance of the dam) is an option to
be considered as other Islands in the
Caribbean have dams have been using
hydropower and geothermal energy as a
means of compensating for a reduction in
fossil fuel options.
13

14. THANK YOU!