The president of the Cabildo of Lanzarote, Oswaldo Betancort, and the Minister of Territorial Policy, Territorial Cohesion and Water of the Government of the Canary Islands, Manuel Miranda, have signed this Thursday the agreement for the transfer of the two portable desalination plants with which it is expected to "mitigate" the water crisis in Lanzarote.
The machinery landed last Monday on the island from La Palma, where they were temporarily installed to respond to the supply shortages caused by the eruption of the Cumbre Vieja volcano, and will now be installed and prepared for operation at the Díaz Rijo Desalination Center in Arrecife. This was reported by the Cabildo of Lanzarote in a press release.
The loan of the desalination plants "is the emergency response that the Government of the Canary Islands has given immediately to the crisis in Lanzarote, caused among other reasons by the damage suffered by the island's canalization network - in which almost 60% of the supply is lost - and by the breakage of a frame in one of the water treatment plants that supplied drinking water to an important sector of the population of Lanzarote until last July".
The president of the island corporation, Oswaldo Betancort, thanked the Canarian Government for the speed with which it has acted and pointed out that "communication and administrative collaboration is of vital importance to solve the water crisis that is being experienced on the Island".
According to the counselor, "the desalination plants are capable of converting 5,000 cubic meters of seawater every day, which is equivalent to five million liters that can be incorporated into the island's supply network for use by the population, and thus reduce the restrictions that both Lanzarote and La Graciosa have suffered this summer".
In this situation, both Miranda and Betancort agreed that "the loan of the desalination plants is a short-term solution", which will have to be resolved with the cooperation and impulse of both institutions, counting on the Island Water Council of Lanzarote and the Water Consortium of Lanzarote. For this it is necessary to "collect definitive solutions in the medium and long term regarding the deficit of infrastructure for the production, storage and distribution of water on the island", said Miranda.
Miranda reiterated - as President Fernando Clavijo has assured on several occasions - that "for the General Directorate of Water and for this government, the production, storage and distribution of water in the Canary Islands is a priority issue" that requires a new strategy to address the shortcomings and different challenges that are being raised in the Islands, "because it is not acceptable that in the 21st century the population continues to endure restrictions and cuts in the public water supply".
According to the Councilor for Water of the Cabildo, Domingo Cejas, "an important step is being taken to improve water production, but we must work in parallel on the repair of the pipes in the almost 40 streets of the Island that have the highest percentage of losses".
That is why the Cabildo of Lanzarote plans to allocate more than 90 million euros to develop the Water Action Plan 2023-2027, presented at the beginning of August and which contemplates the renovation of the hydraulic infrastructures of Lanzarote and La Graciosa.
Emergency portable EDAM´S
The two desalination plants that arrived last Monday to Lanzarote from La Palma and that supply up to 2,500 cubic meters of water per day - each one - use a reverse osmosis system, which consists of passing sea water through a semipermeable membrane, subjecting it to dozens of bars of pressure so that, when crossing the membrane, it is possible to trap impurities, molecules and large particles. "This is how bacteria, possible sand dragged by the sea or small plastic particles are eliminated", the Cabildo added in a statement.
Subsequently, chemical products are added to adjust the PH and chlorine to carry out the disinfection and, finally, anti-scaling product, which prevents the dissolved salts from settling on the surface of the pipes.
Finally, the water is pressurized up to almost 70 bars, passing again through the reverse osmosis membrane, causing the separation of salt and water. On the one hand, there is water with a low concentration of salt, which is the one that is distributed for human consumption and irrigation, and on the other hand, a kind of brine that is usually returned to the sea.
