Article

part 2 of the problem statement - society

A brief research on the societal water demands on Texel has shown extreme weather caused floods and water shortages on the island in the past years. In addition the complexity of the water connection to shore makes the system hard to repair.

Floods august 2014

Last august heavy rains caused floods on several parts of Texel, on the second of august 25 to 30 mm of rain has fallen. Despite the installed rain drainage system about 50 cm of water covered the Vliestraat in Oosterend. Other parts of Texel, De Cocksdork and Den Burg also experienced flooded streets and some holiday houses. (http://www.texelsecourant.nl/lees/18645/wateroverlast-door-hevige-regenbuien)
On the other hand Texel experienced a water shortage in July 2013 when a heatwave hit the Netherlands. A leakage in the pipeline between the island and the shore reduced the available water capacity and trucks transporting water were used to fulfil the rising demands. Since the pipeline lies at a depth of approximately 25 meters and divers can only work on it in between tides it took nearly 4 months to repair the leak. (https://www.pwn.nl/overpwn/pers/Paginas/dossiertexel.aspx)These two incidents may be experienced more often as the weather in the Netherlands is becoming more and more extreme. In addition, as the amount of visiting tourists is increasing, yearly water demand on Texel is likely to increase. A bigger capacity of both the drainage system and the water supply system would be needed in order to fulfil the future demands.