Juan Manuel Sosa assures that "the water that comes out of the tap of the people of Lanzarote is of optimal quality" for human consumption. The Public Health laboratory was visited this Monday by the island director of Health and the general director of Water of the Ministry of Infrastructure, Transport and Housing of the Government of the Canary Islands, Orlando Umpiérrez. The visit was made to learn firsthand about the process and the provisional results of the analysis of wastewater, desalinated, both agricultural and domestic use.
In the analysis process in the laboratory, samples of water are taken and the levels of color, chlorine, calcium, magnesium, nitrite and nitrate are compared, among other parameters. The samples that arrive at the laboratory are also from beaches, bathing areas such as La Santa, or the Charco de San Ginés, where the cleaning process "has not yet finished and where weekly analyzes are still being carried out to end the discharge of fecal water", commented Umpiérrez, who added that "the process will end soon and within a year the Charco will be suitable for swimming again".
Public Health is also analyzing the status of public cisterns, the deposits of institutes, school canteens and the sanitation network very periodically. A process that is also done in the treated wastewater, of which Umpiérrez assured that they are of good quality for irrigation. For that reason, the general director has once again encouraged farmers to stop distrusting and use water that "in Las Palmas is used by everyone with great success to irrigate plantations of all kinds." Umpiérrez reiterated that this reused wastewater is not only "almost drinkable but it is cheap".
Regarding quality, allusion was made to a new Decree that the Government of Spain intends for the control of the process of reusing public water. In this regard, the general director of Water assured that "the Canarian desalination plants and treatment plants far exceed the new decree that the Ministry of the Environment will issue." Despite this, he declared that improvements are needed in the supply since the flow will be expanded due to the new sanitation network, which, "although right now with the existing plants in Lanzarote we can cope with that increase, they will be necessary." However, Umpiérrez believes that in due course the capacity of the desalination plants in Arrecife and Puerto del Carmen can be expanded since "I have already requested assessments on an expansion project and the current equipment can be supplemented by new facilities that can be built on the same site where they are already located," he concluded.
