Haulers urged to deposit septage in facility now operational at NRA

CEBU, Philippines - Cebu City’s septic treatment plant at the North Reclamation Area is now in full-blown operation after two months of test runs.

In effect, all private haulers in the city are already required to deposit septic wastes at the facility for treatment before disposal to the city’s rivers and waterways. They collect an average of 175 cubic meters of septic wastes a day from households.

“The facility is one of components of a larger modern septic management system to be implemented in Cebu City,” Lawyer Jade Ponce, chairman of the City’s So-lid Waste Management Board, said.

The P15 million worth of facility was donated by Japan International Cooperation Agency and AMCON, Inc. of Japan, which developed and manufactured the Volute Dewatering Press, a facility that manages surplus sludge from biochemical treatments, livestock wastewater, septic tanks, and oil bearing sludge from dissolved-air floatation thickening tanks.

Last Thursday, the city government, AMCON, JICA, and Department of Environment and Natural Resources unveiled the septic and sewerage treatment facility, which separates dirty water and cake sludge from septic tanks. It has 200 cubic meters capacity and can process 100 cubic meters of wastes per hour.

Ponce said the city is going to create a governing body to oversee the septage management program and the enforcement of the provisions of the Philippine Clean Water Act of 2004.

But pending the creation of the management, the Solid Waste Management Board will temporarily monitor the facility.

Also, the City’s Septage Management Board is yet to determine and compute the tipping fees to be charged to the septic haulers based on an accumulated per cubic meter of sludge treated or disposed.

CSMB is responsible for administering and regulating the implementation of the city septage management plan as mandated under the newly approved Septage Management Ordinance, which requires a mandatory desludging of septic tanks and authored by Councilor Nida Cabrera.

Desludging of septic tanks takes place every three years or when the tank is half full of sludge. For the households, the owners are required to desludge every five years. —/NSA (FREEMAN)