IMPROVEMENTS to the sewerage system in Orihuela Costa can begin now that the regional government has awarded the contract for a sum of almost €5.7 million.
The job is scheduled to take 12 months, including a test period, and will be carried out by the company Orthem-Eiffage Infraestructuras, an Orihuela town hall spokeswoman explained.
The bid was €900,000 lower than the estimated budget, which was set at €6.6M, a saving
of 14.5%.
The town hall noted that the evaluation criteria included the cost, but ‘excluded abnormally low’ offers.
Other factors were the company’s promise to reduce the completion period from 15 months, its experience in the field and qualified workers, and extending the guarantee to five years, as well as ‘environmental aspects and qualitative criteria, such as an interference study’, amongst others.
The sewage and wastewater treatment system for the coast of Orihuela is made up of nine pumping stations and a treatment station (EDAR) fed by four wastewater pumping stations (EBARs) – Los Caballos, La Regia, La Zenia 2 and La Solana.
In the summer, these EBARs operate simultaneously and exceed the pretreatment capacity of the system, so part of the flow received by the EDAR goes directly into a tank for treated
water at a rate of between 500 and 1,000 cubic metres per day. The principal objective is
to increase the reliability of the system by resolving the EDAR’s capacity problems.
This will be done by connecting the system of this residential area to tanks that are further afield, to divert the flow to treatment stations in neighbouring Torrevieja and Pilar de la Horadada, which are currently working at 48% and 67% of their capacity.
This will require several pumping stations to be renovated or remodelled, and new pressurised pipelines and collectors to be constructed. The improvements should also resolve blockage and overflow problems that particularly occur when there is heavy rain.
More in Friday’s Costa Blanca News
