| Work Detail |
Judge Sylvia Aramberri demanded that the company Aguas Santafesinas, the Province and the Nation carry out the necessary works to treat the sewage that reaches the Paraná from the Southern Emissary. They also demanded that they control the dumping of atmospheric trucks in Ayolas and Circunvalación. The Federal Court ordered the construction of a treatment plant for sewage effluents that are dumped into the Paraná River in the south of the city without controls by Aguas Santafesinas SA (Assa). Rosario judge Sylvia Aramberri issued a ruling that addresses a claim for contamination dating back several decades. In this case, she admitted the lawsuit filed by the Civil Association Cuenca Río Paraná against the state company, the Santa Fe Sanitary Services Regulatory Entity (Enress) and the ministries in charge of the States of the province of Santa Fe and the Nation. The ruling requires concrete measures to solve the problem. Above all, it calls for the execution of specific works on the effluents that reach the Paraná from the Southern Emissary, by the current concessionaire of the service, Aguas Santafesinas. Cuenca Río Paraná welcomed the ruling because it considers the contamination of the Paraná River to be an environmental crime and because it requires the construction of a treatment plant, although goals and deadlines have yet to be defined, the NGOs lawyers said. The ruling also requires a series of controls on the dumping of atmospheric trucks in Ayolas and Circunvalación. Environmental and public health risk The extensive ruling contains the arguments of the lawsuit filed by the Cuenca Río Paraná association. They explain that since the sanction of Law No. 2,797 in 1981, it has been prohibited to dump untreated sewage effluents into the rivers of the Republic and that in its article 2 it indicates as the main concern the sewage waste of the Federal Capital and the city of Rosario. In Rosario, the argument that supports the case continues: “untreated sewage is being dumped, which is understood to represent a risk scenario.” The lawsuit “alleges poor controls and possible acts of corruption, which add to these sewage not only emerging and bioaccumulative contaminants but also various types of effluents, industrial, pathological, infectious, toxic, etc., which, among others, contain substances such as chromium and mercury, according to information sent by the Sanitary Services Regulatory Entity, which it cites.” Since the city lacks a sewage treatment plant and, as a result, sewage is discharged into the Paraná River, the problem is expressed in an environmental risk and to public health. The text asserts that the water flow will never be able to purify heavy metals, insecticides and any other bioaccumulative substance that can be found in said effluents. The damage generated, he concludes, endangers the environment and violates the current public order, and requires immediate and necessary intervention by the judicial authorities to achieve the cessation of the illegal activity carried out by the co-defendant company Aguas Santafesina SA. The changes ordered by the ruling In point five, the judge ordered the company and the responsible government entities to take the appropriate measures to carry out the necessary works to provide proper, prior and adequate treatment to the sewage effluents that are discharged by the current concessionaire - Aguas Santafesinas SA, or whoever it may be in the future - from the Rosario South Outfall into the Paraná River. It imposed on the parties the duty to produce half-yearly reports regarding the administrative procedures carried out and the works performed in this regard, for their knowledge and control. Until the clean-up work is completed, item six of the ruling adds, Assa must strictly comply with the provisions established in the Regulations for Quality Control of Dumping of Atmospheric Trucks in Ayolas and Circunvalación. Among other things, it requires the State to strictly comply with quality controls of the effluents received prior to their discharge, such as: assessment of color and appearance, perception of odor, and measurement of pH and temperature of all loads received. «Carry out a complete analysis of the parameters of interest, such as: COD, SS10min., SS120min., Chromium, Cyanides, TSS and Total Hydrocarbons on 5% of the trucks that enter and unload at its facilities. If parameters are detected that do not correspond to residual liquids of domestic origin, the competent authorities must be informed in accordance with the procedure provided for in the applicable regulations», it continues. The authorities must also require all atmospheric trucks arriving at the Reception Centre, located at Ayolas and Circunvalación, to discharge sanitary effluents, to present the legal forms with all the data. When rejection parameters are verified in the quality control, refuse to load the effluents. |
