2023-12-03 06:00:00
Heads down, we are immersed in a restricted space 1.40 meters high, with a nauseating odor… This is where the wastewater is collected. Proper clothing is required to protect once morest illness. The sewers of Brussels are a veritable reservoir of viruses and bacteria.
What we see flowing… It’s “what you produce at home”says Olivier Lagneau, director of “Network Operations” at the public company Vivaqua. “It’s the discharge from the sink with soap, dish soap and then some food residue… This is what comes out of your toilet, so solid droppings and toilet paper. This is what comes out of your shower, so the shower gel and everything. It’s very dirty water.”
Each sewer is connected to a nearby building. It is a tiny section in the very vast Brussels network. There are 2,000 kilometers of pipes to take wastewater to treatment plants. An astonishing labyrinth… but which has weaknesses: “You can see on either side of where I am, places where the bricks are completely missing. This is the start of a structural problem.”points out Olivier Lagneau.
A dilapidated structure
The result of an obsolete network built from the middle of the 19th century, then often abandoned by the municipalities. Direct consequence of this dilapidation: repeated collapses, like last October. “Here, in this trench, there was a sewer. There were even two sewers: the sewer from the avenue and the sewer from the street which is there. And indeed, it was this junction which was completely collapsed on itself. The earth under the road was gone and we had a cavity of 350 m3.”
Workers must therefore repair as quickly as possible. They install hulls, that is to say modern piping. But their work is not limited to emergency operations. They are also busy renovating the network in depth: 220 kilometers to be consolidated as a priority. 15 kilometers per year for 15 years to avoid disaster scenarios.
“There might be, as we have known for years, subsidence of roads. Holes which are created in the surface covering and possibly a car which might fall in”warns “Network Operations” director of the public company Vivaqua.
A colossal project worth around 70 million euros per year to modernize Brussels sewers.
Tailor-made
To limit the bill, the manager launched his own factory two years ago to manufacture his pipes. “This is really the nerve center of the factory where we will mix the different constituents of the pipe, that is to say the sand, the resin, the fiberglass on the mold”explains Olivier Broers, director of “Studies and Investments” at the public company Vivaqua.
Tailor-made, according to the needs of the field: “It allows us to be agile in relation to the unexpected, to have orders that arrive ‘just in time’ on construction sites as well. Also from a cost point of view, the fact of having our own factory, it represents a saving for the community because we are able to produce less expensively than when we bought them from suppliers”he continues.
They produce around 5 to 6 km of pipes per year. “They are made of polyester, reinforced with fiberglass, a bit like a boat hull. And in fact, the goal is to have a lot of slipperiness inside this pipe.”
Long-term underground work
Guaranteeing optimal flow is a major challenge. If it rains hard, a cavity 1.80m high can fill up very quickly. 130 million m3 of wastewater and rain are collected over the course of a year in all the sewers. “The sewer must continue to fulfill its primary function, which is to evacuate wastewater. Otherwise, there are health risks for the population. It also evacuates all rainwater today. And we know that With climate change, there are more and more large water holes that can release more water.”
Workers carefully inspect the sewers. Long-term underground work with thousands of rats for company. The network manager seeks to curb their proliferation so that they do not invade the capital and to protect its workers who devote their daily lives to the health comfort of Brussels residents.
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