Belgium: The European Investment Bank is lending EUR 100 million to Aquafin to construct sewage and wastewater treatment facilities in Flanders, Belgium. This loan supports Aquafin's major investment programme of EUR 2.7 billion to improve the environment in the Region of Flanders to meet national and European environmental requirements. The water management programme for the region includes construction and modernisation of mains sewers, pumping stations and sewage treatment facilities. Aquafin manages 200 wastewater treatment plants and 3,500 km of mains sewers.
Mauritius: Transport costs for materials and equipment at the remote Midlands Dam site in Mauritius required an exact utilisation plan to minimise the total project cost. The 2,450-m-long Midlands Dam is being constructed as an earth fill barrage with a height of 38.4 m, a length of 88 m, a width at the base of 26.m and a width on top of 4 m. The concrete spillway is a major structure at the centre of the dam. Together with adjacent structures joining the earthfill dam, the spillway is constructed with Doka formwork systems. After the utilisation plan was worked out, only 1,750 m2 of formwork was used for the approximate 48,000 m3 of concrete poured. All the supports, both the supporting construction frames and the D22 brackets, followed the grid pattern of the Doka formwork elements. The contractor DTP Terrassement-Bouygues JV and Austrian firm Doka carried out the formwork.
The Midlands Dam is scheduled for completion by mid-2003, creating a reservoir covering an area of 300 ha, and making up to 25.5 million m3 of water available for irrigation and for processing into drinking water. Doka Formwork Technology is based in Amstetten, Austria.
Russia: The Russian Minister of Atomic Energy Aleksandr Rumyantsev proposed the implementation of an international demonstration project of a nuclear-powered desalination facility under the auspices of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA). The minister suggested this proposal at the IAEA General Conference in Vienna on 18 September.
Researchers in Russia are looking for ways to process spent nuclear fuel (SNF). The minister explained that Russian research and development efforts since the 1960s makes it possible to manufacture third-generation distillation desalination units with a capacity of 700 m3/h of water. Russia could develop an improved reactor unit based on shipboard reactors used in the civilian fleet and the navy as part of the project, he said.
Yemen: The Ministry of Agriculture and Irrigation appointed Mott MacDonald to design and supervise the third phase of the Wadi Hadramout Agricultural Development Project (WHADP). The KD 8.7 million project, partly funded by the Arab Fund for Economic and Social Development, will consolidate and expand agricultural production in Wadi Hadramout by constructing irrigation canal networks, tubewells and 16 km of flood control bunds.
Phase 3 completion will be Summer 2004.
