Riachuelo: World Bank approved a loan of US $ 265 million for its sanitation

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The Matanza Riachuelo Basin Authority (ACUMAR) highlighted the importance of the credit that will be allocated to the Dock Sud Treatment Plant and the industrial effluent plant in Lanús.

The cleaning of the Matanza Riachuelo Basin continues to advance and in the last hours, the World Bank approved a loan of 265 million dollars with the aim of advancing the infrastructure works that will strengthen the Riachuelo System, the works of the Curtidor de Lanús Park, and its Liquid Effluent Treatment Plant, as well as works to expand the water and sewer network in Villa 21-24.

As reported from the Matanza Riachuelo Basin Authority (ACUMAR), its Executive Director and General Coordinator of the loan's executing unit, Daniel Larrache, stressed that "this support given by the Bank is very important to advance in key works for the Sanitation of the Riachuelo and specified that the priority will be to advance with lot 2 of the Riachuelo System, this is the Dock Sud Treatment Plant, but we will also advance in the PIC and the industrial effluent treatment plant in Lanús.

In this sense, they pointed out that the financing will allow the completion of the works to expand the sewage system in the metropolitan area, known as the Riachuelo System, which, once it is operational, will allow the incorporation of 1.5 million inhabitants to the network and improve the provision of service to more than 4.3 million people.

The Riachuelo System is a mega-work of sanitary infrastructure carried out by AySA and was reactivated at the end of 2019, reaching today a global advance of more than 70%.

For her part, the president of the state sanitation company, Malena Galmarini, stressed that this "is a unique infrastructure work in the world, due to the size of the construction and the number of users it will benefit. It will improve. not only the transport capacity of sewage liquids and the quality of the service but also the sanitation of the Matanza-Riachuelo basin thanks to the treatment of effluents.

This additional financing will allow the completion of the Riachuelo Pretreatment Plant, located in Dock Sud, Avellaneda, which will treat the liquids from the Left Margin Collector, before their final disposal in the Río de la Plata through a 12 km long underwater outlet.

In turn, they indicated that they also hope to advance with the expansion of the water and sewer networks in Villa 21-24 and with the reduction of industrial pollution, since part of this credit will be used to accelerate the works of the Curtidor Industrial Park and the Industrial Liquids Treatment Plant in the Lanús district, where small and medium tanneries will be located in the basin to produce in an environmentally friendly manner.

Since 2009, the World Bank has financed the Project for the Sustainable Development of the Matanza Riachuelo Basin, for which it granted three loans for a total of 1,227 million dollars for improvement, sanitation, industrial control, territorial planning, and flood management in the Basin.

This is the second additional financing to the Project and it is a variable margin loan, repayable in 32 years with a 7-year grace period, they explained in a statement.