Projects

World Bank

Assessment of Croatian Sea Waters Quality and definition of future Monitoring Strategy.

ambiente s.c. has implemented in Croatia a water management project on behalf of Hrvatske Vode, the national body responsible for the management of the public water system. The project falls within the framework of the Second Coastal Cities Pollution Control Project entirely funded by the Word Bank with the objective of improving sanitation services and reducing the amount of nutrients in Croatia coastal waters. In particular, ambiente s.c. carried out environmental monitoring activities for the characterisation of the Croatian coastal waters and the Neretva river.

The project could be divided between:

• Assignment A: Definition of monitoring strategy. In this first phase ambiente s.c. studied the territorial, socio-economic and environmental characteristics of each of the 38 monitoring sites with sewage treatment plants that discharge into the sea. In addition, the sewage systems and wastewater treatment plants (existing and planned) were analyzed and evaluated in terms of efficiency. Marine currents (seabed, intermediate and superficial) were measured at all the monitoring sites by applying models, and the conditions of exposure of each coastal area were defined, identifying the beaches that are potentially exposed to the environmental impact of releasing effluent into sea.
• Assignment B: Execution of environmental monitoring. In particular, it forested the implementation of 4 oceanographic campaigns aimed at monitoring 36 sites along the Croatian coast and 2 sites located near the last stretch of the Neretva river. At each site samples were taken for the monitoring of the water column, sediments, macrobenthic communities and biota is foreseen.
• Assignment C: aimed at training managers and technicians of Hrvatske Vode, Croatian ministries and public health institutions, technicians working in state analysis laboratories and local sewage treatment plant operators. Three workshops were done. The first was held in Opatija (near Rijeka) from 2 to 3 October 2013 on “The state of coastal and transitional waters”. In November 2013 a second workshop was held on “Sampling techniques, measurement, analysis and processing/assessment of monitoring data”, including training sessions on a boat and in the laboratory. In 2014 a workshop on “Sewage treatment techniques and management of plants” was performed, with further training of technicians in the ambiente s.c. laboratories, Italy.

The project concluded with an overall assessment of the data and an analysis of the correlation between the data relative to the quality of incoming and outgoing effluent from the purification plants and the quality of the marine and river ecosystems monitored. Lastly, a national strategy was formulated for long-term monitoring, in accordance with the requirements and guidelines of EU Directives (Water Framework Directive and the Marine Strategy Framework Directive).