The new sewage treatment plant being built in Companhiera, on the west side of the EN125 road bridge over the Arade river near Portimão, will be ready for action next March after an investment of €11 million by the regional water company.
The Secretary of State for the Environment and the head of Águas do Algarve have visited the site which will have a capacity to treat the sewage output of 140,000 inhabitants and eradicate the obnoxious smell that has welcomed road and river users for years and has made life in the village of Companheira a daily and unhealthy burden.
The water company chief is proud of his new plant which will replace the old, hopelessly overburdened, ETAR unit but is less willing to explain why the farms lying upstream in the Monchique area, continue to be allowed to discharge animal waste into the river .
Promising a stink-free future, Águas do Algarve’s president, Joaquim Peres, did admit that these farms remain a problem but he concentrated on the new sewage treatment plant, its capacity and the likely production of 27,000 litres a day of grey water that can be used by local municipalities to irrigate their green areas.
How much of the current smell is from human waste, and how much from animal waste, remains to be seen when the plant opens next March.
Llocals will be able to enjoy at a reduction in the ‘Arade Stink’ if not a total eradication if the upstream animal waste is sufficiently diluted in the river water.
Similar to the council’s inaction in Olhão where sewage flows from the city, day in and day out, into the Ria Formosa, the up-river council of Monchique and the State's various environmental agencies turn a collective blind eye to farmers dumping animal waste into the river Arade, even though this is a serious offence.