A new sewage treatment plant will be built in Muharraq in an attempt to reduce the burden on Bahrain's aging network.

Details of the multi-million-dinar facility were revealed yesterday by Works Ministry Sanitary Affairs assistant under-secretary Khalifa Al Mansoor.

He said the government was investing BD110 million in the project, but added it would require 'several millions more' from the private sector.

The plan is to bring a private firm in to help fund and operate the plant, which will be located in the Hidd-Arad area.

'This plant will be of a capacity of 100,000 cubic metres of sewerage per day, expandable to 160,000,' Al Mansoor told our sister newspaper Gulf Daily News (GDN) yesterday on the sidelines of the Infrastructure Middle East Conferences and Exhibition 2011.

'For the first time in Bahrain, we shall use micro-tunnelling technology, by which a 15-km sewerage tunnel will make its way 15 metres under the ground taking in sewerage from across the area to be treated at the plant.'

'This process will not disrupt traffic or be visible. It will also cost less than the conventional method and last as much as 80 years.

'The project will be completed within 30 months of the contract being awarded. It will cater to the Busaiteen, Arad and Hidd areas, and take a lot of load off an aging sewerage network in Manama.'

Meanwhile, Al Mansoor said a major upgrade of the Manama sewerage network was underway.

'After the upgrade is completed, there will not be as many problems of overflowing sewers, but the problem will remain somewhat until the Muharraq plant is completed,' he added.

Al Mansoor also announced a major upgrade of the 200,000 cubic metres per day Tubli sewerage treatment plant, saying an expansion has been long overdue.

'This plant has been receiving up to 300,000 cubic metres per day and is severely overloaded,' he said. The projects are being carried out as experts finalise a 'roadmap' for the future of sanitation in Bahrain.

'A strategic study is now being finalised with the aim of providing roadmap for restructuring the entire state-owned sanitary services, including identification of packages suitable for private sector participation, setting up a legal framework for quality and environment and guidelines for establishing cost recovery mechanism,' added Al Mansoor.

He said the ministry's vision was to improve standards of living by adapting to changing economic conditions, making best use of limited resources and adopting approaches that would result in sustainable and affordable services.-TradeArabia News Service