92 million euros are arriving in Sicily for the construction of priority water infrastructures. This is the first tranche of funding destined for the 49 interventions, for a total of 1.6 billion, included in the Sicilian Region’s Water Plan, fully approved by the Ministry of Infrastructure and incorporated into the National Plan for the Safety of the Water Sector (Pnsii).
The regional planning was prepared, by order of the President of the Region, Renato Schifani, by the Department of Agriculture, in agreement with the Basin Authority, the Department of Water and Waste, Siciliacque, the Land Reclamation Consortia of Western Sicily and Eastern Sicily. The Plan is aimed at programming the works necessary for primary water supply, drought prevention, strengthening and adapting infrastructure, also to increase resilience to climate change and reduce water dispersion by improving distribution networks.
“With this first tranche of funding – says President Schifani – we will immediately start working on some of the works planned to address a phenomenon that is hitting our Island hard. It is only the beginning of the mass of interventions that we have foreseen in the Plan that the Region has finally equipped itself with for the first time with a systemic overall vision. Now we move on to the operational phase, with the regional structures committed to implementing what is planned without delay. We will ensure that Sicilian citizens and entrepreneurs can have concrete answers as soon as possible to fill the long-standing gaps in our water system”.
The priority interventions in the Plan are classified as class “A”. These include the automation, control, modeling and monitoring works of the over-area drinking water infrastructure (cost, 50 million) and the link between the San Leo reservoir and the Gela water treatment plant (11.7 million) for which the implementing body is Siciliacque spa. The Consorzio di bonifica 9 of Catania will instead implement the interventions for the replacement of the metal pipeline on the Simeto river in the Ponte Barca area, with which the irrigation volumes are delivered to the intakes at 100 and 56 meters above sea level (cost 23.4 million). A further intervention on the Simeto, by the same Consortium, includes the extraordinary maintenance of the system of flood gates of the Contrasto dam for the supply of the irrigation system (cost 48.8 million).
