Making the most of the opportunities for growth in Spain – this was the goal of REMONDIS Aqua International GmbH when it acquired the local water management specialists OMS-Sacede a good four years ago. Since then, the company has been pushing forward its expansion strategy on the Iberian peninsular with its pioneering projects to treat wastewater and generate energy.
Founded in 1979, OMS-Sacede is a company based in Barcelona with subsidiaries and associated businesses across the country. This REMONDIS subsidiary offers a range of services from treating wastewater and sewage sludge all the way through to generating efficient energy. Electricity, for example, is produced during the sewage sludge drying process via combined heat and power plants and biogas is recovered from the wastewater. Geographically, it primarily operates in the well-structured regions of Aragón, Catalonia and Valencia. Over the last few years, OMS has been able to considerably expand its circle of municipal and industrial customers – despite the difficult economic climate following the financial crisis.
REMONDIS Aqua’s Spanish company recently succeeded in winning a public tender to operate and maintain the sewage treatment plant in Miranda de Ebro, a city situated in the northern province of Burgos. The facility provides water management services for over 50,000 local inhabitants.
Three local authorities from Catalonia have also extended their contracts with OMS. The collaboration with the City of Banyoles focuses on operating the municipal sewage treatment plant for which OMS has been responsible since 1996. In contrast, the company is in charge of the sewage sludge drying facilities in both Montornés and Terri.
Thanks to their many years of experience and their comprehensive specialist knowledge, REMONDIS Aqua and OMS were also called in to help implement an extensive water processing project on the Llobregat, the second-longest river in the region. OMS has already been put in charge of managing operations at nine facilities as part of this project. Other facilities are currently being built and these will also be managed by the REMONDIS Group’s Spanish experts once they have been completed.
One of OMS’ most important industrial projects currently involves a wastewater treatment facility in Casasbuenas, a district approx. 65 kilometres from Madrid. Further north east in Tèrmens, the company is in the process of extending an industrial wastewater treatment plant, which it had originally planned and built back in 1998. The primary aim here is to reduce the nitrogen content of the water. By using a membrane bioreactor, the amount of nitrogen will be reduced from its current 2,000 to just 20 milligrams per litre – i.e. one hundredth of its present volume.
In the north west of Spain, OMS is implementing an industrial project in the Galician district of Pontesampaio to plan and develop a new wastewater treatment facility. Plans are for the water to be discharged into the River Ulló which flows into an extremely ecologically sensitive region: the bay of Ria de Vigo on the Atlantic. The requirements regarding the mechanical and biological treatment processes are, therefore, correspondingly high.
The company has already completed a project to extend and commission a biological treatment facility for industrial wastewater in San Martin y Mudrián, a district in the north Spanish region of Castilla-Leon. The project was brought to a successful conclusion last year. Today, the plant is playing an important role in helping to protect the environment. Based on the level of efficiency it has achieved, it can feed around 290 cubic metres of treated water into the River Pirón every day.