The Chairman of the Mancomunidad, the Almuñécar Mayor, his councillor for Urban Planning and the Head of the water untility company, Aguas & Servicios, had a good stare down a hole in the road.

The hole in question was on Calle Real in La Herradura where the water mains pipes were being replaced.

There is nothing more enticing for our Spanish hosts than a hole in a road, especially with a worker at the bottom, because the workman obviously requires their expert advice on how, whatever he is doing there, should be done. Staring at somebody working, after all, is a national passtime, especially for people who have retired.

Mancomunidad Chairman, Rafael Caballero, explained that this is “a necessary task because the pipes were old fibre-cement ones and had reached their Use-By Date.” As you will probably have guessed, because it has been going on all over the Costa Tropical, these pipes are being replaced with 300mm/diameter PVC ones.

As was the case in a village up Río Verde Valley a month or so ago, he claimed that they were more environmental friendly, although it’s hard to see how. If anybody knows why plastic is better than cement on the environment, please leave a comment at the bottom of this article. Likewise, do so if you feel it is complete ‘bollards.’

Mayor Juanjo Ruiz Joya snapped out of the trance from peering down the hole to point out that the Town Hall was supplying the work force and Aguas & Servicios the material… One would have thought that the water-utility company had to supply the lot, but never mind.

The mains-water pipe running under Calle Real is the main artery in La Herradura, and from there the water supply is distributed to the entire town below.

(News: Herradura, Costa Tropical, Granada, Andalucia)

Keywords: Mains Water, Aquas y Servicios, Calle Real, Pipe Replacement, PVC, Mancomunidad

news, andalucia, granada, costa tropical, herradura, mains water, aquas y servicios, calle real, pipe replacement, pvc, mancomunidad

Reader’s comment: “Actually about 5% of the world’s CO2 emissions come from cement production and is therefore a major contributor to global warming. Then we have Energy Consumption: producing cement requires a significant amount of energy. Added to those there is the impact of Raw Material Extraction. The extraction of raw materials for cement production also has environmental consequences. Not sure about plastic.” – Paul Francis

Hadn’t thought of that as I was just thinking about what affect the two materials have buried in the ground – Martin