Orihuela City Council awards the contract for the new water reservoir

Orihuela City Council has awarded the contract for the second drinking water reservoir on the coast to double and guarantee the supply to current and planned homes in a constantly growing area.

The company Cesyr Estudios y Construcción has won the tender, launched in March with a base budget of more than 2.3 million euro, which is 400,000 less than initially planned, presenting an offer of 1,874,398 euro that represents a reduction of 470,397 euro.

Four other competitors took part in the bidding process: Etosa Obras y Servicios Building, with 1,972,911 euro; Construcciones Hermanos Espín, with 2,157,212 euro; UTE Construcciones y Movimientos Ovisa-Mistral 3000, with 2,176,667 euro; and Aquambiente, Servicios para el Sector del Agua, with 2,187,225 euro. Along with being the lowest bid, the winning company offered several improvements, such as waterproofing the roof and an extension of 24 additional months of warranty.

The execution period is set at eight months for an action that has been pending for more than two decades, despite being a strategic infrastructure meant to reinforce the supply system and guarantee the water reserve, which serves as the engine of tourism, urbanism, and population in the municipality. The coastline has faced issues with water flow and supply due to a lack of sufficient reserve capacity, a situation persisting since at least 2010 due to a lack of foresight, and the new measures will now allow a minimum to guarantee the supply.

The new reservoir will be built next to the existing one, which was constructed in 1995 in the El Canal area of Los Dolses, and will feature the same capacity of 6,000 cubic metres. This addition will double the current reserve volume for the Peña de las Águilas water intake, increasing it from five hours of reserve to ten once completed, thereby allowing for greater security of supply for customers in the event of a breakdown or incident.

The 2024 budget included a capital investment section of 40.9 million euro, of which one of the largest was the drinking water reservoir on the coast, initially budgeted at 2.8 million euro before being reduced to almost 2.4 million euro. The project will be carried out for 1.8 million euro following a lengthy process that was halted two years ago by the City Council Secretary.

This initiative forms the first phase of a set of planned actions to reinforce the hydraulic system of the coast under the Master Plan for Drinking Water Supply of Orihuela Costa, which was updated in 2023 with the arrival of the current government team. The plan incorporates the necessary hydraulic infrastructure for the supply and storage of water volumes for current and planned homes in the General Urban Development Plan, ensuring both pressure and supplied flow.

Hidraqua, the company operating the sewage and drinking water service, warned in 2022 about the impossibility of supplying planned urban developments that included 21,314 new homes, stating that its capacity to supply drinking water to buildings was at 100 percent.

Alongside the new reservoir, a second drinking water intake will be required with a planned investment of 15 million euro over a four-year period. This second phase involves various actions under development, such as a new intake from the Cartagena canal in the PAU-21 to provide an alternative water source and a greater volume of supply, as well as the installation of a pumping station from the Taibilla Canals Association to the new PAU-21 reservoir and other infrastructure.

The development of important urban projects pending in La Regia, Cala Mosca, and PAU-7 depends on these steps. Meanwhile, with an outdated General Urban Development Plan dating back to the 1990s that fails to meet current needs, specific modifications continue to be approved. This has drawn criticism from opposition parties such as the PSOE and Cambiemos, who typically oppose further rezoning of land like that seen during the real estate boom, which they argue exacerbates problems with intensive urban development that fails to implement services or guarantee water supply.

Implementing the two planned phases of the Master Plan for Drinking Water Supply in Orihuela Costa allows the City Council to guarantee supply for all urban development planned in the current General Urban Development Plan, ensuring adequate flow, pressure, and sufficient reserve during incidents.

The importance of the infrastructure for the PP and Vox coalition was highlighted during the presentation of the tender by the mayor of Orihuela, Pepe Vegara, alongside the councillor for Urban Planning, Matías Ruiz, the councillor for Infrastructure, Víctor Valverde, and governing team member Anabel García. The councillor stressed that the action reflects the commitment of the two-party coalition to promote necessary future municipal infrastructure, even for projects lacking an immediate visible impact on citizens, by looking beyond the short term. He added that the new reservoir is not a definitive solution on its own, but an important step within a broader project featuring new pipelines and a structural solution to ensure supply.