The production of so-called 'newater' in resource-parched Singapore is part of the drive to reduce reliance on neighbouring Malaysia, which currently supplies about half its daily water needs.

The government has been on a hardsell campaign in recent months, promoting newater with a series of public seminars, and claiming 98 percent of those who attended were in favour of drinking water reclaimed from sinks, baths and toilet bowls.

More than 650,000 bottles of newater have also been handed out to help people "overcome the psychological barrier" of gulping down recycled water.

From February, the government will begin adding newater to its raw water reservoirs, starting at less than one percent of daily consumption and building up to about 2.5 percent by 2011.

Approval to use newater followed two years of "comprehensive physical, chemical and microbiological analysis," by a panel of experts, the environment ministry and the public utilities board (PUB) said in a joint statement.

It found newater to be "well within the drinking water standards specified by the US Environmental Protection Agency and World Health Organisation."

The PUB "accepts and endorses the proposal to use newater for indirect potable use," board chairman Tan Gee Paw said.

"This means mixing and blending newater with raw water in the reservoirs before undergoing conventional treatment at the waterworks for supply to the public for potable use."

Water has been a key irritant in bilateral relations since Singapore was kicked out of the Malaysian Federation and gained its independence in 1965.

Singapore has declared it would be able to let one of two water agreements with Malaysia lapse in 2011, serving notice that it was increasingly becoming self-sufficient in water.

"With newater, we can be better assured that Singapore will, now and in the future, have enough water at an affordable cost to meet all our needs," Environment Minister Lim Swee Say said.

"Newater is a safe, affordable and sustainable source of water supply. It will enable us to be more self-sufficient in water."

Although newater is to be added to drinking water through reservoirs, its primary use will be for direct non-potable commercial use in areas such as wafer fabrication plants, industrial estates and air-cooling systems.

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