as of december 31, 2010 the staff complement of the aguas group was 1,926 employees, 6.9% more than the figure for 2009.
Staff complement 2010
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gOOd nEigHBOR POLiCY
initiated in 2005, the good neighbor Policy seeks to establish a channel of direct communications between aguas andinas and the residents close to its sewage treatment plants. as part of this plan, in 2010 we continued with the work done by the Work Tables, opportunities for communication and dialogue to listen to the opinions and concerns of the neighbors of the plants.
during the year we held Work Tables in the municipal communes of Pudahuel, Maipú, Til Til and Padre Hurtado comprised of members of the neighbors’ associations, municipal authorities and the Casa de la Paz and Corporación para el desarrollo sustentable organizations, together with staff from aguas andinas. in each one of these, analyses were made of the impact of the Company’s installations, mutual responsibilities were defined and plans for collaboration were drawn up.
FOndO “suEñOs dE BaRRiO”
Por quinto año consecutivo, aguas andinas realizó el fondo concursable “sueños de Barrio”, el cual entrega aportes financieros a proyectos de desarrollo comunitario a organizaciones cercanas a la Planta de Tratamiento de aguas servidas La Farfana.
El objetivo de este fondo es convertirse en una ayuda concreta y real para mejorar la calidad de vida de los vecinos, fortalecer la participación ciudadana en la gestión ambiental de la localidad y promover acciones para preservar el medio ambiente.
durante 2010 se presentaron 30 proyectos, de los cuales se seleccionaron 14 de la comuna de Pudahuel y 4 de Maipú, pertenecientes a juntas de vecinos, organizaciones femeninas, deportivas, juveniles y culturales.
asimismo, durante el periodo se establecieron dos fondos sociales, uno para la comuna de Padre Hurtado y otro para Til Til.
PadRE HuRTadO
aguas andinas participated and cooperated in the process of electing and the execution of the 2010 Participatory Budget Program, which took place in Padre Hurtado. With this, we also complied with the provisions of Point 7.3.11 of Exempt Resolution nº 266 issued by the Environmental Qualification department of COREMa Metropolitana (the Metropolitan Region Environmental authority), dated april 1, 2009.
• Projects assigned: 18
• Total amount assigned: CLP 52,578,000 TiL TiL
in order to comply with the compensation measures established in point 10.21 of the Resolution on Environmental Qualification of the “El Rutal Comprehensive Biosolids Treatment Center”, we made a commitment of a social development Project for the municipal commune of Til-Til in coordination with the Municipality.
Through these three funds, the Company favored 60 organizations, providing over CLP 152 million for executing their projects
“aguas andinas in MY nEigHBORHOOd”
since its inception, the “aguas andinas in my neighborhood” program has benefited more than 60,000 families corresponding to low-income housing estates. The idea of this plan is to promote a proper conduct in the use of the service, facilitate the solution of problems in their installations and in the payment of their bills, together with helping with their access to state subsidies, in a joint effort between the Municipalities and the community. With it, aguas andinas seeks to support those clients in order that they can receive a continuous and sustainable supply.
during the year, the program benefited 16 thousand families through diagnoses of their installations, cleaning their interior sewerage pipes, rescheduling their debts, help with arranging their subsidies, workshops on the correct usage of the installations and recreational educational activities for children.
MORE sOLidaRiTY
given the extent of the human and material losses in the country caused by the earthquake, the Company chose to be part of the aid to the national reconstruction and made a strong commitment to the “Chile helps Chile” campaign, a total donation of CLP 210 million Chilean Pesos. Of this amount, 60 million were donated by the controlling company, agbar, and 150 million directly by aguas andinas. To this figure should be added over 200 million Chilean Pesos invested in work to support the rural potable water systems in the Metropolitan Region.
in addition to the donations in cash, the staff created a campaign of help in the field, gathering some 240 volunteers between personnel from the aguas group and their families and friends.
COMMUNITY
SUSTAINABLE dEVELOPMENT
CLEan uRBan MaPOCHO
Having become a bicentennial project and an environmental milestone of santiago and the country, on January 31, 2010 the Clean urban Mapocho came into operation. On that day, we initiated the functioning of the large 25-kilometer long collector interceptor, which permitted the elimination of 21 discharges of sewage that existed in the river between the municipal communes of Las Condes and Pudahuel.
This significant work, which changed the capital’s look by decontaminating the waters of its main river, was inaugurated on March 30 by the President of the Republic, sebastian Piñera, during a ceremony attended by important authorities and senior representatives of aguas andinas.
Furthermore, with its start up, we achieved a coverage of 86% of the treatment of the sewage produced in the Metropolitan Region.
The total investment in the project amounted to usd 115 million, which includes contracts for the construction, design, inspection, consultancy and the acquisitions of land.
The Clean urban Mapocho brings great benefits to the city of santiago. amongst these are:
• Better of quality of the river’s water.
• Elimination of unpleasant smells along its riverbed.
• decontamination of the La Punta, La Pólvora and Casas de Pudahuel irrigation canals.
• Recovery of the riverside areas for the city’s inhabitants.
• Return to Chile’s capital a clean and decontaminated river.
MaPOCHO PLanT
during the year, we commenced the construction of the third large sewage treatment plant in santiago called the Mapocho Plant which lies on a plot of land next to the El Trebal Plant.
This installation, which is due to come on stream at the beginning of 2012, will have a treatment capacity of 2.2 m3 per second. it includes very advanced technology such as thermal hydrolysis, which will permit a lower production of biosolids and with less humidity, achieving a lower cost of their transport and final disposal. also, it will produce electricity through cogeneration, which will result in a significant reduction in its operating costs.
The future Mapocho sewage Treatment Plant, jointly with the Farfana-Trebal interceptor, implies an investment of approximately usd 260 million and is a demonstration of the commitment by aguas andinas to decontaminate 100% of the sewage generated in the santiago Basin in order to protect the environment and the future of next generations.
ENVIRONMENT
EL RuTaL PLaTFORM
as part of the closure of the Hydric decontamination of the santiago Basin Plan, there is the construction of the future El Rutal Comprehensive Biosolids Treatment Center. This installation, which will be located on a 1,800-hectare plot of land 50 kilometers north of the capital, contemplates an investment of approximately usd 16 million.
The biosolids generated in the Company’s sewage treatment plants will be stored in this platform in order to utilize them in their various beneficial applications.
BEnEFiCiaL usE OF BiOsOLids
at the end of 2009, the Regulation on the Handling of sludge generated by the aguas andinas sewage Treatment Plants was enacted. This, together with a collection of Resolutions on Environmental Qualifications, permitted aguas andinas, in 2010, to boost the agricultural use of biosolids, mainly in extensive cultivations such as corn, wheat and meadows in a responsible, controlled and informed manner.
due to this, during the year we utilized 60,000 tons of digested and spun biosolids from the La Farfana sewage Treatment Plant with optimum results, which validates its sustainable and beneficial use on soil versus the alternative of final disposal that exists in the Metropolitan Region (such as sanitary landfills and monofills). in this way, aguas andinas increased the value of 37% of the biosolids generated in La Farfana, a figure the Company hopes to raise in order to reduce the environmental liabilities over time, improve and recover soil for the ecosystem, diminish the flows of lixivated nitrogen to the aquifers together with the savings on nutrients and organic matter for the farmers.
This overall view the Company is taking is consistent with the experience acquired on an international level over the past 30 years in the united states and the European union, which points at strengthening the alternative agricultural use of biosolids as a fertilizer, utilizing beneficially around 60% of the sludge generated by its sewage treatment plants.
aCTiOn in ViEW OF THE CLiMaTE CHangE
Conscious of the global warming phenomenon, aguas andinas, within its “strategy to Face the Climate Change”, considered that it was important to calculate the aguas group’s “carbon path”, which corresponds to the quality of greenhouse gas effects (ggE), expressed in units of CO2 equivalent, emitted during the life cycle of a product or service.
in order to calculate the path, we utilized CaFCa, a tool developed by the Water Technological Center of agbar, specifically for the sanitation sector. This tool permits us to record the emissions from the production, transport and distribution processes, as well as the emissions in the non-operating installations. The value obtained reached a total emission of 172,000 ton CO2 eq/year.
Based on this figure, the future challenge for the Company is to establish targets with respect to the level of emissions and to boost plans such as the La Farfana Biogas Project, Cogeneration in the Mapocho Plant and the El Rutal Biosolids Center.
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