The public water company Acosol, dependent on the Commonwealth of Municipalities of the Western Costa del Sol, has launched this Thursday the boat service to maintain water quality of the coast during the summer, which will be active until September 7 and for which an investment of “half a million euros” will be allocated, as reported by the executive delegate, Manuel Cardeña.
Thus, it has specified that the service is made up of “a total of 15 boatsone more than in previous years”, which will be “based in the ports of the Costa del Sol” located between the municipalities of Torremolinos and Manilva.
As detailed, the objective of the initiative is to “make water controls on our coasts and guarantee that thanks to the cleaning of Acosol and the work that is carried out, they are in perfect condition”.
Its main function is the prevention of pollution episodes in bathing areas and the collection of floating solids, grease, and other residues, in open sea waters, up to six miles from the coast.
Cardeña has pointed out that “in situations in which any solid is found, the ships are trained for this removal “, as well as those of greater volume ” to remove any spillage or cream that is not natural that is found on the coasts.
The service will be in operation until September 7
For the provision of the service, it has indicated that the joint entity will allocate a investment of “half a million euros”which will be in operation until September 7, noting that it “intends to guarantee and reassure the quality of the waters along the entire coast.”
Cardeña stressed that “these boats will put a special effort into the water analysisespecially in those points close to the submarine outfalls”, adding that “these data will be analyzed and we will be able to establish strategies and develop techniques that guarantee the best possible quality for the waters of the Costa del Sol coast”.
For her part, the Commonwealth technician, Eva Vedia, has detailed that of the 15 vessels “four are coastal, with a dimension greater than 12 meters in length” and that they work “from 200 meters from the sea line to inside, outside the bathing area”.
As he has indicated, these boats “what they do is prevent an avalanche, a large stain or an unforeseen event from coming”, as well as serve as “support” for small beach boats “if there is a fairly continuous and voluminous collection, to be able to unload” and prevent “dirt or possible stains before they reach the shore”.
Meanwhile, the remaining 11 are beach boats that “they work close to the shore and have a very small draft to be able to get very close and collect the solids that the bathers come across first”, and whose “capacity is less, but they have more accessibility to the shore allowing cleaning like this more fast”.
The collection of solids will be done in a segregated way
As a novelty this year, he pointed out that the collection of solids “is going to be segregated” with a selective separation, noting that these 15 ships are in charge of collecting floating and semi-submerged solids, as well as hydrocarbons and oilseeds.
Refering to distribution of boats, Vedia has specified that “the little ones go two by two, because they have to be accompanied and they are sweeping the coast”, in addition to one large one. In this way, he has indicated that “they leave from a port and in each marina there are three or four boats”, as in the cases of Marbella or Fuengirola respectively.