Maghtab to be turned into a national park

An international call for proposals on how to turn Maghtab into a national park will be issued by the end of the month, Environment Minister George Pullicino said yesterday.

However, the park, which would cover an area of 510,000 square metres - the old part of Maghtab and all of Zwejra - will materialise only within six to eight years.

Asked if families would want to picnic on a former landfill, Mr Pullicino said the gases would have been extracted and it would be a nice, safe area where people could relax.

Mr Pullicino, together with WasteServ chief executive Vince Magri and numerous experts in the subject, yesterday toured Maghtab on the occasion of Europe Day, to show how EU funds were being used to improve the environment.

Mr Magri explained that an Enemalta sub-station was being built so that eventually the gases extracted from Zwejra, Ghallis and Maghtab would be used to generate 1.5 mega watts of power a day - sufficient to meet the needs of some 3,000 households.

This intervention will allow the complete rehabilitation of the site, although this will be achieved over a number of years, including the moving of material, the laying of soil and landscaping.

Touring the area in a mini van, Mr Pullicino explained that the first phase of the Maghtab rehabilitation project started with the contouring of the mountain of waste to create platforms and access routes for vehicles. The inert waste was also used in the process in order to ensure that nothing of the rubble left the site.

Mr Pullicino reiterated that the landfill - together with Tal-Qortin in Gozo - had been closed since the end of April 2004.

All the domestic waste which is not recycled - about 220,000 to 250,000 tons a year - was now being dumped in the Zwejra engineered landfill, while the 1.2 million tons of rubble and construction waste generated annually were being diverted to unused quarries.

The third part of Zwejra to be opened should be full within a few weeks and the first phase of Ghallis, which has an estimated lifetime of seven years, would start taking in the waste.

Mr Pullicino insisted that every individual should take care of the way they disposed of their waste and be conscious of the great importance of having the necessary facilities which did not have a negative environmental impact.

Mr Pullicino added that the revised National Strategy for Waste was to be released at the end of the month.

He referred to the studies carried out on the Maghtab, Qortin and Wied Fulija landfills, where intervention was recommended to ensure such landfills did not continue to spoil the environment.

That's when WasteServ obtained a total of €8.4 million from the EU's Structural Funds under the Regional Development Fund for the implementation of the project entitled Aerial Emissions Control. This project includes the control of the aerial emissions and the rehabilitation of the Maghtab landfill.

Mr Pullicino insisted that all this was being carried out to strengthen the foundations and to create stability in the huge mass of waste, as well as to prepare the site for the rehabilitation works.

"That is why we chose to come here, as it is important for people to be conscious of the EU's vast contribution to our country, especially to the waste management sector," he said.

Mr Magri said that following the stabilisation process currently underway, the latest technology will be used to control the foul smells and treat the dangerous gaseous substances before these were released into the air.

This phase includes the installation of steel structures within the waste mass creating steel wells. In Maghtab alone, some 300 similar structures are needed.

He also said that the project includes the building of a structure where gas can be stored and turned into electrical energy.

"This is a very important challenge. At the time when the old sites were used, the environmental impact of such a practice was still unknown, and so the gas control system emanating from dumped waste was simply not used," Mr Magri said.