YORKSHIRE Water is to spend about £16 million rebuilding its biggest water treatment works in York.

The company says the investment at Acomb Landing will further improve the quality of water supplied to about 100,000 people in west York and the city centre.

The new works will be constructed on land alongside the existing complex, which dates back to 1846 and treats water from the adjacent River Ouse.

A spokesman said that rather than continuing to maintain equipment which was ageing and becoming less efficient, there came a point where it made more sense to start again.

He said the old works had been extended three times between 1846 and 1968 to ensure it could cope with growing demand from households across the city.

“The last major increase in capacity took place in 1968, and following this expansion, Acomb works had an average output of about 46 million litres of clean water a day,” he said.

“In 2002, part of this service was handed over to our newer Elvington works, with Acomb works reduced to supplying around 30 million litres a day, and our Elvington works supplying the remaining 16 million litres to about 80,000 people.”

Water compliance manager John Haley said the project was part of a £1.9 billion investment to be made in the company’s infrastructure across the region between 2010 and 2015, which was announced last week.

“The plant will be re-engineered and completed by 2015, with a start date for the work still to be decided,” he said. “The current Acomb works will continue to operate as normal while this new plant is being created.”

He said other projects also included £115 million to improve bathing water quality on the Yorkshire coast. The company spokesman said that across the whole region, it supplied 1.24 billion litres of drinking water each day – equivalent to 49,600 Olympic sized swimming pools.