Drought in Rome: the capital at risk of water rationing. The point of the situation

Water emergency: Lazio is in a state of natural disaster due to drought. On July 5, President Nicola Zingaretti had signed the natural disaster decree, and the situation is not improving, on the contrary. The capital risks rationing water starting from July 28th. But how did we get to this situation?



Water emergency: Lazio is in a state of natural disaster due to drought. On July 5, President Nicola Zingaretti had signed the natural disaster decree, and the situation is not improving, on the contrary. The capital risks the water rationing starting from day 28 July. But how did we get to this situation?



It hasn't rained in months and this is an unequivocal fact. Several municipalities have already sent requests for water supplies for drinking and zootechnical use to the Regional Civil Protection Agency, due to the lack of the relative sources. And in the meantime, the integrated water service operators have excessively taken from the sites entrusted to it in concession.

Index

The capital dependent on a lake that has no tributaries

Drought in Rome: the capital at risk of water rationing. The point of the situation

In particular thewater supply of Rome seems to depend on a lake that has no tributaries, namely the Bracciano lake, which is now in an environmental emergency, finding itself well below zero hydrometric. Hence the decision of the Region to suspend the forced withdrawals to avoid their drying up, starting from 28 July, when the capital could find itself facing thewater rationing nightmare, that is to the 8-hour suspension of the water supply in turn between the neighborhoods. For its part, Acea does not approve the decision on the suspension of withdrawals.

“After the order issued by the Lazio Region on Friday evening unilaterally, which one continues to believe inadequate and illegitimate - the company spokesman wrote in a note - Acea learns only from the press that the Region would have always hypothesized a alternative plan to obviate the uptake of water from Lake Bracciano, by planning to use other sources or by increasing the flow rate of the current ones. If the Region wishes to illustrate these solutions, in the appropriate locations, Acea will be ready to listen and collaborate ".

Water rationing at the gates?

Drought in Rome: the capital at risk of water rationing. The point of the situation

Is it possible that there are no solutions? It is really true that the final decision is that of turn the water supply between the Roman quarters? We reached Acea on the phone, which did not confirm. “The idea is precisely to avoid rationing and we are working towards this […] Dirimente will be the technical table which will take place with the Minister of the Environment Galletti and the interested parties between 26 and 27 July ".



Following these declarations, Acea also specifies that the map of the areas affected by the alleged water rationing, disseminated by some press, was not issued by Acea itself, and that it is a overview of historically at risk neighborhoods, not of the areas really interested in the release of water, a decision that still it was not taken definitively.

If what we learn from the communications of the bodies concerned is true, however, in a few days we should therefore have the real solution, which we hope does not seriously coincide with water rationing, which it could also involve hospitals, in a period, among other things, of intense heat.

Infrastructure never built

Drought in Rome: the capital at risk of water rationing. The point of the situation

“In the initial project, that of the 80s which then led to the concessions of the 90s, the lake was considered one emergency measure - Enrico Stronati, President of the 'Progetto Comune' Association had told us, who for months has been denouncing the situation of Lake Bracciano - They were in fact planned a series of infrastructures that have never been realized. And that's the problem. One of these measures was clearly the closure of the water cycle, that is strategies to ensure that the water coming from the sewer ring of the lake is not discharged into the sea, as happens now ".


Other water sources that are not properly exploited. This appears to be the heart of the situation, obviously aggravated by natural drought. “Other infrastructures had to be built to make converge other sources of water coming for example from the Sabatini or Reatino mountains, sources that now do not meet the needs of Rome - continued Stronati - When Acea became private in 1996, the profits were used for other reasons, divided among the shareholders, including the Municipality of Rome, which takes 60-80 million euros a year from Acea to do something other than infrastructures ".


To learn more about the water emergency in Rome and Lazio, read also:

  • DROUGHT IN ROME, NATURAL DISASTER IS REQUIRED. WHAT ARE THE CAUSES AND POSSIBLE REMEDIES?
  • LAKE BRACCIANO IS DISAPPEARING: A SILENT ENVIRONMENTAL DISASTER (PHOTOS AND VIDEO)

In the meantime, Acea announces the water suspension in some areas of the XIV Municipality, even if apparently only for urgent maintenance work, which will nevertheless be carried out on July 28th.

Roberta de carolis

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