(DY) The physical location for the biological treatment plant is in the wrong place, in my opinion. I personally don't know how the choice came about. The plant was built in 1995 when it was still the Hersonissos Port Community. 

In this region we mostly get north-western winds, and they transport all the smells that a biological treatment plant offers. In our plant, we also have sewerage impurities from Gouves, Malia, Kastelli, and even Iraklion.  Now, the physical location of the plant is the first problem. The second problem is that, in the afternoon hours the winds turn around into south-western winds, changing the direction of the odours.

(Khronicles): What's being done to correct the problem?

(DY) More than a year ago, after numerous studies, we implemented a very modern deodorizing process with nitric salts in many of our pump-stations.

(MV): We did go through a number of other deodorizing processes like with sulphurous acid, but in trying to deodorize the sewages we would create a new and just as awful an odour.

(DY): The nitric salts that we use are fertilizers which we dissolve in containers, and allocate, depending on the quantity of sewages in each pumping station. That's why we no longer have any serious problems with unpleasant odours. We did not pioneer this deodorizing process. It was successfully tried elsewhere and now we have adopted it in our region.

(MV): What we still have to do is the following: there is a sheet-metal structure where the urban sewage enters initially and the sand separates from the solids.  Because there is hydrogen sulphide in sewages it creates sulphurous acid which in turn stays on the sheet-metal which eventually rots.  The cost to repair this structure is around 45,000 euros. We have taken all relative decisions, but we do not have the finances at this moment to proceed in the replacement of the structure. This is the only point that could emit any odour. And this is only during the afternoon hours, as we said.

(Khronicles): Is there a budgeting program for its replacement?

(DY): We have it in the national program, but because this period is very difficult economically, we cannot go on with it. Our citizens cannot even pay up their municipal bills and we wait for that money to do our works. Our enterprise here is also our income; in essence, what we collect we give back in community works.

(Khronicles): On another subject, do you have a lack of water here?

(MV): We buy from Malia, but due to over-consumption we distribute to different areas at different times of the day, but we don't turn it off for days.   

We have three new drillings completed in Abdou, with a total projection of 100 cubics of water an hour from a 500 cubics reservoir and the water, of excellent quality, is to be channelled to Hersonissos.

(Khronicles): Do you have any problems with sewage being channelled into the sea waters like in some other municipalities?

(DY): Essentially, no. It does occasionally occur, but the port authority chases it. The region that could present this problem is the area after the Belvedere where there is no sewage network. Occasionally I have been called and I have seen foams that could have emanated from the surrounding hotels, and due to the sea currents, the impurities surface a bit further away but the port police is responsible to uphold the law.

We, as an agency, must check that all businesses that use our sewage network do it correctly, and we also try to get more enterprises to use our sewage network. Of course, if we notice that somebody empties out his cesspool into the sea we immediately report it.

(MV): Finally, I would like to add that this enterprise, with all the problems that had in the beginning, has been constantly improving.