Investigator says Fagilde Dam is a mistake: “We will build badly”

O professor and researcher of the University of Coimbra Fernando Seabra Santos argued today that the new dam of Fagilde, in the river Dão, in Viseu, is a mistake, since the future of GirabolhosIn Mondego, you can supply the region.

“The construction of Fagilde, what is on the table, is to increase Fagilde’s capacity by building a [new dam] larger downstream, for 30 million euros (ME),” said the professor and former rector of the University of Coimbra, when questioned by the congress audience about the importance of dams and dams.

Seabra Santos spoke at the first congress “Mondego, what future for this watershed?”, taking place today in the city of Viseu and which had the presence, at the opening, of the mayors of Viseu and Guarda and of a councilman of Coimbra.

The presidents of Viseu and Guard left after the opening, as noted at that time, the teacher who belonged to the morning panel, along with three other actors.

“ The solution of this problem in a technical and economically advantageous way is to bring water [from the dam] of Girabolhos” on the River Mondego, “practically without elevation.” “So if we had the ability in Portugal to integrate these various functions we would earn money and solve a number of problems,” the professor and researcher pointed out.

And he added: “We built Fagilde, badly. Let's build Fagilde two, mal”, even recognizing that “Girabolhos will not solve all the problems”.

A Girabolhos Dam it is designed for the river Mondego, covering the municipalities of Seia, Gouveia, Mangualde and Nelas.

Seabra Santos recalled the lack of water in Almada this summer, and retreated to September 2017, when water was transported from the dam of Aguieira to that of Fagilde, using cistern trucks.

The Fagilde dam on the Dão river supplies the municipalities of Viseu, Mangualde, Sátão, Penalva do Castelo and Nelas.

In his view, “a capital city of district and with importance that has run out of water for a whole month and this is not possible in a decent country”, indicating that taking water from one dam to another “did not solve the problem”.

Fernando Seabra Santos also said that all the water that was transported in 2017 between the dams – five thousand cubic meters – was the equivalent of “two and a half seconds of floods in Coimbra”, last February.

At the end of the session, the Lusa agency, the teacher reinforced that the future Girabolhos Dam it can “supply the city of Viseu with technical and economic advantage, because the quota would allow, even avoiding investment in the strengthening of Fagilde” and “it would be a solution for several decades” in the supply.

For this, “it would be necessary to back off a little to rethink things together”, as the process of the new Fagilde dam is underway.

Still, Fernando Seabra Santos recognized that it would be “advantageful, enough that Girabolhos have a quota of 310 meters” cubic reserve.

“Of course, if I had 325 [cubic meters] as it came to be, I would have that advantage. I admit that there may be other inconveniences, I am not within the project that allows me to compare the various functions, but it could be a definitive resolution of the problem ", insisted.

For this, it was “to make the necessary infrastructure and pipelines to transport water to Viseu and to the settlement” covered by the Fagilde dam and that currently “is done under very unsatisfactory conditions”.

The new Fagilde dam was announced on 02 this month by the mayor of Viseu, João Azevedo, an investment of 60 ME for the new dam and for a new ETAR that will be made by Águas Douro and Paiva.

During the intervention, the professor warned of the need for equipment maintenance, giving as an example the Waste Water Treatment Stations (ETAR) and the basic sanitation network.

“ All works have a shelf life which poses a problem to us today too, which is a kind of time bomb. They have been built for 40 years, for a period of validity of 40 years, they are poorly maintained, as almost all infrastructures in Portugal – it is a ‘pecha’ of ours, a brutal difficulty that we have, until we can get millions of euros to do it”.

According to Fernando Seabra Santos, “all politicians like to get millions of euros to invest, but they don’t like to get millions of euros to keep.”.