Work to increase use of recycled water in Malaga province nears completion

Work to increase the use of recycled water and store it in the Axarquía area of Malaga province is nearing completion. After connecting the wastewater treatment plants at Peñón del Cuervo and Rincón de la Victoria, the Andalusian regional government is now undertaking the construction of reservoirs and connections. These actions will benefit some 2,000 farmers and growers in the east of Malaga province.

There is a consensus on the need to use more and more recycled water for a wider range of purposes. This reduces pressure on reservoirs, rivers and groundwater and is vital for provinces like Malaga, which plagued by recurring droughts. Recycled water is wastewater that undergoes a triple treatment process at a treatment plant.

It comes with environmental guarantees, so much so that in some parts of the world (California, Israel, etc.) it is even incorporated into the domestic water supply network. In Malaga experiments are under way, which would imply an indirect use for this purpose.

It's easy to understand that the use of recycled water involves a complex health and administrative process. In Malaga province it has been used for decades to irrigate golf courses, to cool the Campanillas combined cycle power plant, and more recently, for irrigation. This is the case in the Axarquía, where the Andalusian regional government is about to complete another phase of the work to expand its use.

According to technical sources, the construction of two new reservoirs for storing recycled water, along with their corresponding pipelines and connections, will be finished in the coming weeks. The investment amounts to 15.2 million euros. The work is a joint project between the Junta de Andalucía through the state-owned water company Tragsa.

This is the third phase of the project initiated in response to the last drought. First, the tertiary treatment system at the Rincón de la Victoria wastewater treatment plant was connected to the irrigation system (15.3 million euros). Then, the pipelines that carry recycled water from the Peñón del Cuervo plant in Malaga city to the Rincón plant were completed (27 million euros). And now, recycled water can be stored to supply half of the land included in the 'Guaro Irrigation Plan', which affects and around 2,000 growers in the Axarquía. All phases of the project exceed 57 million euros.

The Guaro plan includes farms located below 140 metres above sea level. Both to the right and left bank of the river. The right bank encompasses approximately 6,600 hectares, and this project covers half of the demand, about 3,000 hectares and 2,000 users. The left bank, however, is awaiting the start of similar projects. Their cost would exceed 30 million euros and at the moment does not have access to recycled water.

The work now nearing completion involve the conditioning of a reservoir in Benajarafe, with a capacity of 150,182 million cubic metres and another in Cerro de la Encina, designed for 79,692 million cubic metres. The pipelines, pumping stations, and complementary installations such as remote controls are also included in the contract.

The theoretical production capacity of recycled water in the Axarquía is around 21 million cubic metres per year. However, its use is approximately half of this volume. There are the aforementioned problems of water shortages in some areas, a lack of storage capacity (the reason for these latest works), and even saltwater intrusion in some sections of the pipeline. In this last case, the provincial authority, the Diputación de Málaga, is currently implementing a programme at various points throughout the province to look at other technical solutions.