Official data on the state of treatment waste water in Serbia reveal a gloomy picture - all over the country, waste municipal water ends up directly in our rivers and other waters.
Moreover, in seven districts in Serbia, more precisely in Zrenjanin, Belgrade, Požarevac, Užice, Niš, Prokuplje and Leskovac treatment coverage is zero, it says Climate 101.
The wastewater treatment coverage itself represents the percentage of the population or the amount of municipal wastewater that is collected and purified in facilities before being discharged into nature.
Only in the mentioned districts, a total of 2,8 million people live, according to the last population census. While in the rest of the country, the situation may be slightly better, but it is far from good.
Greater coverage than 50 percent is recorded only in the north of Vojvodina and in some parts of western and central Serbia, but even this does not offer a complete picture of the poor state of wastewater treatment in Serbia.
What types of treatments are there?
The extent of wastewater treatment is divided into primary, secondary and tertiary. Primary implies physical removal of large impurities, secondary biological, and tertiary advanced chemical processes.
This means that the "covered" population also differs in terms of the degree of treatment in the facilities. At the same time, previously published research also showed that the existing waste water treatment facilities are generally in poor condition.
In total, according to official data from the Environmental Protection Agency, only about 16 percent of the population in Serbia is covered by wastewater treatment. Unfortunately, that number is not growing at a high rate either, as the share has only increased by about five percent in the last 10 years.
Wastewater treatment plants are complex machines that are expensive and must be built and dimensioned in accordance with the needs, it is something in which Serbia must invest systematically and long-term.
Source: Air Conditioning 101
