The construction of the new Ortiga WWTP has already entered the pre-start phase

The Ortiga parish will benefit from its potable water supply system, in a project worth around 640 thousand euros and which contract was signed this Thursday in a ceremony held in Paços do Concelho. This project, together with the construction of the new WWTP, which has already entered the pre-start phase and has a design and construction cost of around 594 thousand euros, aims to strengthen the quality of water supply and improve the quality of life of the “Ortiguense” community in regard to basic sanitation..

The project, described by Vasco Estrela, Mayor of Mação, as "important" and "one more investment of AdVT in the county," aims for “a general remodeling of existing infrastructures", namely in regard to "conduits and reservoirs", it’s expected the construction of "5km of supply pipelines and two new reservoirs, the one of the Pontão with two cells of 100m3, equipped with a filtration and disinfection system and the reservoir of Lagoinha, of 100 m3", as well as the rehabilitation of the reservoir of the Football Field, said Águas do Vale do Tejo (AdVT), in the person of its president José Manuel Sardinha, also present at the signing ceremony.

José Sardinha mentioned that this investment, along with other interventions announced for the future, represents "a continuous bet on the qualification of public infrastructures in this territory".

In the case of Ortiga's WWTP, the engineer said that "it will allow the deactivation of septic tanks that exist, two sets of compact installations" that generated problems in the past, and which solution represented an increase of investment two years ago.

Despite the "high costs", the same official stressed that "environmental costs" ceased to exist, since the wastewater no longer flowed from the old equipment, which brought "return" both in terms of "investment" to the populations, fish production and improvement of the environmental quality". The WWTP, which entered in pre-start on Thursday afternoon, is scheduled to start operating in three to four months, reusing the structures created by the municipality, which is the case of wastewater ducts that “will now be integrated into the new system in order to conduct the wastewater to the new facility”, he said, noting that the municipality's investment "is not thrown away" as it has been in the past, and still happens in other regions of the country.

Carlos Martins, Secretary of State for the Environment, and Vasco Estrela, Mayor of Mação, clicked on the button to pre-start the new Ortiga WWTP.

The session was attended by the Secretary of State for the Environment, Carlos Martins, who referred to the WWTP of this riverside parish as an important equipment in order to give "greater quality to the treatment of effluents and to be another contribution to the collective work of depollution of the Tagus river".

On the other hand, the official acknowledged that the contract to rehabilitate the water supply system to Ortiga, "improves water quality, the flexibility of the water supply system, creates greater reservation capacity allowing, in a critical situation, quantity and quality of water for the beneficiary populations".

Contextualizing the strategy at national level, Carlos Martins assured that "the country is committed to creating the conditions to gain greater flexibility in the management of a resource as important as water", taking into account "the longer periods of drought and the climate changes".

In this sense, these infrastructures become one of the solutions found to "minimize these effects so that the populations can face the future with tranquility, that more companies can be fixed here" so that the community acquires "first generation" infrastructures and "absolutely basic public services that only took a long time to arrive, but which we now want to accomplish and that are well-operated, well managed, guaranteeing technical and economic-financial sustainability so that future generations have no worries, in this matter”, he noted.

Vasco Estrela, president of the Municipally of Mação, expressed his thanks, in his speech, on behalf of the council he leads, in the person of the Secretary of State for the Environment for "the work done [by the Government] and the determination they put in the problems of the Tagus River".

"Seeing the Tagus River today and seeing it two years ago, has strictly nothing to do," he said. For his part, Carlos Martins told the press that he had good indications, "from the local authorities, from the people who have economic activities by the river, fishermen, who use the river for recreational activities", about the "very significant improvement in quality "of the waters of the Tagus, something that he understands could" leverage another set of economic activities and investments that were seeing their interventions disturbed".

The objective is to "maintain the quality we have achieved" and recalled the latest measures taken and investments made in this area, namely with regard to monitoring with pollution and flow sensors and the notice of hiring five custodians for the Tagus Project that will allow "to monitor more proactively and in proximity and continuity".

The Secretary of State for the Environment assumed that this is an "unfinished" work and it is important "to sensitize the intervenients, agents and citizens" to the fact that it is from "our behavior and the companies’ that we can secure the future and since Portugal made this effort "with all entities" it is desirable that this meritorious work should continue and ensure its sustainability, "he concluded.

By: Joana Rita Santos | mediotejo.net