Thursday, June 12th, 2008 |
Water stealing on the Costa del Sol is no small thing and something that goes on much more than is generally realised. In the last post about Feria de los Pueblos I covered the popular fairground attraction in Fuengirola. Now I turn my attention to the problems with water on the Costa del Sol.
Recent surveys have suggested that the Andalucian province with the highest number of wells built illegally as well as individuals who connect their properties to the public water supplies without the necessary permission is Malaga.
Out of the total 513 cases that are being investigated by the Andalucian Water Agency during the first six months of 2008, a staggering 218 are in the Costa del Sol province of Malaga. This is followed by 165 in the province Almeria, another 103 in the province of Granada and just 27 in the province of Cadiz.
A spokesman for the Andalucian Water Agency said that fines range from €600 to €30,000 depending upon the severity of the situation. The average fine for general householders committing this crime is around €6,000.
Water is never in abundant supply in southern Spain especially during the long hot summer, which make these crimes all the more heinous as it has the potential to rob legitimate households of their water during these months.
Terry Didcott
PS: Costa Del Sol
Posted in Costa Del Sol Environment | 1 Comment »
Sunday, January 27th, 2008 |
In the Costa Del Sol city of Malaga, 4,000 litres of used cooking oil has been collected by specially adapted containers in the first month of the initiative to reduce the amount of this oil dumped into the sea. That is the equivalent of eight days worth of oil flowing into the sea from the city of Malaga alone.
This is the amount of recycled cooking oil that has been collected throughout the past month in special containers that are placed in Costa Del Sol streets and key areas in the program initiated last month by the non-government association, Madre Coraje. In total, 17 containers have been installed In the Costa Del Sol’s Malaga area with 500 litres capacity each.
The manager of the Madre Coraje association, Fernando Almarez said that containers located in the Costa Del Sol markets of Churriana, Cuidad Jardin and El Palo were the ones to have collected the most used oil. Where other areas were having two weekly collections, these areas were having to be collected from weekly.
This the first assessment of how well the system has been working, so it has to be taken into account that Costa Del Sol schools local to many of these containers have been closed for the Christmas holidays, meaning that the containers were not accessible for around two weeks.
The association has managed to come to an agreement with residents of the local Costa Del Sol communities as well as restaurants that have shown an interest in placing close to them the special 60 litre containers.
Almarez said “They have already been installed in Cuidad Jardin and Jacinto Benavente and the Ecologists in Action association has asked for one, as well as the El Cenachero and El Consul restaurants. In casesd like this, our own association volunteers collect the used oil.”
The Costa Del Sol based program aims to recycle around 200,000 litres of used oil, thereby preventing it from reaching the sea while transforming it into soap that will be destined to be sent to Peru. The remaining oil will be sold on to companies that convert the used oil into bio-diesel, further reducing the environmental impact on the Costa Del Sol.
More informacion can be obtained from the Madre Coraje association at www.madrecoraje.org.
PS: Costa Del Sol
Posted in Costa Del Sol Environment | 3 Comments »
Picture by G J Allen
