RTL Today – Pollution in Luxembourg: A hundred groundwater catchments are currently out of service
Since 1993, March 22 has been World Water Day. In Luxembourg, more than half of drinking water comes from groundwater catchments.
The Ministry of the Environment published on Tuesday, in collaboration with the Water Management Administration, a report on the state of groundwater in Luxembourg. There remain a number of opportunities for improvement in this area.
Luxembourg has nearly 250 groundwater catchments, operated by 53 municipalities and five drinking water syndicates. A hundred of these catchments cannot currently be used for the production of water intended for human consumption because of the poor quality of this water. About 13,000 m3/d of groundwater, which meets the needs of more than 65,000 people, is unfit for consumption because it is polluted by human activities such as agriculture.
The “great challenge” of out-of-service catchments
The Minister of the Environment, Carole Dieschbourg, qualifies these numerous catchments out of service as “big challenge“The demographic and economic development of Luxembourg, but also climate change will increase the country’s drinking water needs.
Water is and remains a limited resource without ceasing to expose to different threats. Among these is global warming. Environment Minister Carole Dieschbourg:
“This is already the case today, we really feel that it has been drier in recent years. We had a year where it was a bit more normal, but previous years had been extremely dry. Moreover, it is true that although the amount of rain was the same, the springs could not have filled as well, because the rain fell at the wrong time, then it was completely absorbed by the vegetation.”
Pollution by nitrates and pesticides
Another threat is the residues of nitrates and pesticides in the soil. This leads to certain catchments not being able to be used for a longer period of time. Groundwater catchment protection zones have therefore been created, recognizable by specific signage.
Protection zones, within which polluted catchments are protected by various restrictions, should allow the restoration of the quality of the water, so as to make this water again fit for consumption. The restrictions are particularly severe around certain highly polluted catchments.
It is necessary to put an end to the treatments hitherto usual in agriculture:
“In Luxembourg, the motto is that we do not want pesticides or their degradation products. Metazachlor ESA is the degradation product of metazachlor, long ignored in Luxembourg. We do not want pesticides or herbicides. And we must also take be careful not to have leaching as with nitrates.”
Water suppliers have worked with agricultural companies to enable the transition to more resource-conservative agriculture. At the national level, financial aid has been announced for farmers.
The Syndicat des eaux du Sud is in charge of operating more than 60 catchments and provides clean drinking water for consumption to 230,000 people. To do this, strict controls and processing facilities are required. Frank Wersandt of the Syndicate explains the process:
“As an example, we have our three sites of Dondelange, Koerich and Reberg. We have a chlorine dioxide proposal on all three sites. We also have ultrafiltration, these are filtrations that can retain bacteria and viruses The other issue we have in some places is our metabolites with pesticides, you see in this picture, the three containers, they’re activated carbon filters, that’s the only way to extract that.”
All concerned
To control pesticide contamination, unions and agricultural companies are collaborating on more resource-friendly solutions. But it is not only in agriculture that pesticides should be avoided as much as possible, there is also the private sector, according to the Minister of the Environment, Carole Dieschbourg:
“At the state, every time new plots are added, we also say that we want to work without pesticides. It is also about choosing the right crop in the garden. our grandparents already knew. For our purchases, we can also use vegetables and fruits that have been produced locally and without pesticides.”
Cleaner groundwater would ultimately lead to less polluted rivers and streams and their overall quality would improve again.
The population can also act to preserve water, in particular by starting with the simplest measures: turning off the tap while brushing their teeth or taking a shower instead of a bath.