Armenia facing threat of losing drinking water: EcoLur
The new residential areas in Armenia may get deprived of their drinking water, which include a number of residential areas in Artik, Akhuryan, Maralik, Armavir, Vgharshapat and Ararat. The reason is the irrational use of underground freshwater, which will result in mineral waters getting mixed with freshwater thus making it non usable for drinking. Irrational works have already made the springs of Sev Jur disappear, the same threatens to the underground springs in Verin Akhuryan, Katnaghbyur, Aparan and Quchak. This alarm signal will be beaten at the governmental meeting to be held on 16 October – when approving “Development Program of National Observation Network for Monitoring of Underground Water Resources in the Republic of Armenia” document. The program says that 96% of the drinking water supply is implemented due to the groundwater, which is also used for other economic purposes such as irrigation, industry, fish farming etc. “In 2009-2013 from 18 to 18.42 million AMD was planned for monitoring 70 observation sites in the national network. These funds don’t include the rehabilitation, recovery costs, costs of equipping them with needed meter devices and transportation costs (essential changes in petrol price). The program sets out 128 observation sites, which annually need around 344,706 AMD for maintenance costs and hydrogeological studies or a total of 44,122,447 AMD,” the program says. EcoLur
