BAGUIO CITY — The Baguio City government needs PHP250 million to rehabilitate its almost 50-year-old sewage treatment plant to catch up with the highly urbanized upland city’s rapid population increase, a city official said on Friday.
The sewage plant, which was constructed in the 1970s, hardly meets the city’s waste treatment needs, Lacsamana said.City Environment and Parks Management Office (CEPMO) chief Cordelia Lacsamana said the plan is to raise the containment capacity of the plant from 8,600 cubic meters to 20,000 cubic meters.
An upgrade would also allow more sewage connections to link with the facility and reduce pollutants being released to the choking Balili River, she said.
The sewage plant rehabilitation is part of Baguio’s four-year priority development plan. The project is open to public-private partnership, as the city’s finances are hardly enough.
Lacsamana said Baguio Congressman Mark Go had already committed to give PHP100 million in 2019 for the rehabilitation of the facility.
To remedy the plant’s limited capacity, the city government had installed a dewatering machine that allows harvesting of the sludge for drying and production of organic fertilizer.
Baguio City Mayor Mauricio Domogan, in an interview with the media on Wednesday, said the main problem is the local government’s insufficient funds to rehabilitate the sewerage treatment facility.
“If we can get assistance from the national government, then we can secure bigger plans for the rehabilitation of the existing facility,” he said.
Also included in the city’s long-term project is the putting up of four satellite septage treatment plants along Balili, Bued, Galiano, and Ambalanga rivers, to help treat the increasing volume of sewerage wastewater brought about by the increasing population.
Earlier, the Environment Management Bureau (EMB) had written the city government about the pollution contributed by Baguio to the Balili River.
“While it is true that some parts of Baguio are already serviced by the STP (sewerage treatment plant) of the city and plans for its expansion are being considered, the fact remains that as of the moment, the same is already heavily overloaded (and has) compromised its efficiency level,” EMB Regional Director Reynaldo Digamo said in the letter. “Design capacity was only good for 8,500 cubic meters per day, but is now receiving more than 12,000 cubic meters.”
Another concern of the city and the environment department is that thousands of households and small establishments are not connected to the sewer lines, seriously polluting the Balili River, which flows out to La Union province as the Naguilian River. (Pamela Mariz Geminiano/PNA)
