1. Sewer system
2. The Czajka sewage treatment plant
3. The Południe sewage treatment plant

The Warsaw sewer system was created at the same time as the water-works. At the end of the 18th century sewage still flowed straight into the Vistula River from open gutters or covered drains. In 1881 construction of a sewer system began according to a plan by Englishman William Lindley. The basic sewer arrangement has remained to this day.

With regard to the lay of the land, a gravitational-pump system is used in Warsaw. The city has two independent sewage systems on the right and left banks. The right bank (Praga) system leads to the Czajka mechanical-biological sewage treatment plant, while raw sewage is released into the Vistula from the left bank (around 750,000 cubic meters a day). In the center of the city the sewage system is collective, carrying off sewage and rain water to all-purpose sewers, while on the outskirts where hydrographic conditions permit, there are separate storm and sanitary sewers. The permanent sewer system is currently 2,020 km long and serves 90 percent of the capital's population. The biggest problems of the Warsaw sewers are:

• overloading of the network in the central part of the city,
• the lack or deficiencies of the network in outlying boroughs and in the Łuk Siekierkowski area of the Centrum borough,
• the lack of sewage treatment plants.

Most people beyond the reach of the sewage system live in the Wawer, Białołęka, Rembertów, Włochy and Targówek boroughs. In these areas new single-family homes usually have their own septic tanks. The tanks are then emptied by waste-removal trucks and the sewage dumped into the municipal sewers at four drainage stations, located on the following streets: Jagiellońska (Praga Północ), Korotyńskiego (Ochota), Karlińskiego (Wola) and Odlewnicza (Białołęka).

The Czajka sewage treatment plant

The first sewage treatment plant in Warsaw, Czajka, started operation only in 1991. Czajka is situated on a 56-hectare site in the northeast part of the capital (in the Białołęka borough) and processes sewage from right-bank Warsaw and Legionowo. Czajka is one of the largest treatment plants in Poland. Before it went to work sewers from the entire city discharged straight into the Vistula.

Because it took 17 years to finish the plant, much of the equipment in use and technical solutions are already outdated, so modernization began almost simultaneously with operations. The plant was designed with a flow capacity of 400,000 cu. m per day, and currently around 50 percent of this is exploited. Despite continuous modernization, Czajka remains a somewhat old-fashioned plant, however studies have confirmed that it provides a relatively good level of purification.

The Czajka plant will be further modernized.

There are plans to build new sewage treatment plant Południe. Preparations for construction on the most populous side of the Vistula have dragged on for eight years already.

The Południe sewage treatment plant

It is built in the Zawady neighborhood, not far from the Siekierki Heat and Power Station in the Wilanów borough. The investor is the City of Warsaw, acting through the Południe Sewage Treatment Plant Company, in which the city has a 100-percent share. The plant is on a site of 25.7 hectares. Together with adjoining buildings (warehouses, a bus depot, railway siding, repair shops, a green waste composting plant) it covers 62 hectares.

Because the aim of the investment project is protection of the waters of the Vistula River and Baltic Sea, the project has been included in the international Baltic Sea Comprehensive Action Program. Residential sewers from the southern part of left-bank Warsaw will be directed to the planned plant as well as a smaller number of industrial sewers. Południe will serve a region populated by around 400,000 people (Natolin, Ursynów, Siekierki, Sadyba, Wilanów and Powsin). The plant will have a projected flow capacity of 112,000 cu. m per day, with expansion possibility to 224,000 cu. m per day.

The application of state-of-the-art technology will allow a very significant reduction of pollutant levels in the sewage and protect the natural environment surrounding the plant. This is particularly important because it is located near the Wilanów palace and park complex. The waste processing line will be the first system of its kind in Poland. The waste will be dried to a granular form which can then be used as fertilizer, or as fuel for the heat and power station. Another unique technical solution in Poland will be a fats bio-degradation system. The biogas emitted during the waste fermentation will also be used for heating. Most of the technological processes will be automatically controlled and visually monitored by a computer system.

There won't be any unpleasant smells, even on the plant grounds, because most of the processing structures will be covered, and the contaminated air drawn into a deodorizing filter. The feasibility study, technical plans, power system plan, and an analysis of its effect on the environment are already complete. In May 1999 water law permission was granted along with a construction permit, however the date these decisions come into force and the start of work have been delayed by protesting ecologists.

The cost of the first phase is estimated at 116.8 million euro. Construction of the sewage treatment plant is to be financed by:

• The European Investment Bank (a contract signed for a loan of 45 million euro),
• The National Environmental Protection Fund (an application filed for a loan to cover about 45 percent of investment costs),
• the City of Warsaw (is to cover about 20 percent of the costs from its own funds).

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