Water specialist shoulders the burden of responsibility
EYATH IS PLAYING A KEY PART IN MANAGING THE LOCAL ENVIRONMENT ON THE NORTHERN COAST

CHRISTOS TSONGAS President and Managing Director of EYATH

Water is a very precious commodity in Greece’s arid climate, but something that is often in short supply. It means that a large amount of responsibility is borne on the shoulders of the regional water board managers, who are investing many millions of euros into new potable water schemes and wastewater systems up and down the country. The need to protect the environment through efficient wastewater treatment and cleaning systems is equally vital, given the importance of the high-profile tourism sector.

The Thessaloniki Water Supply and Sewerage Company (EYATH) is playing an integral role in the management of the local environment in and around the northern coastal city, as well as providing drinking water to some 850,000 residents.
The company – formed from the merger of the city’s two former separate water and sewerage organizations – has helped pioneer clean-up work in the surrounding Gulf of Thermaikos area.
Professor Christos E. Tsongas, President and Managing Director at EYATH, has led the fight. “For more than 30 years all the sewage was discharged untreated into the Gulf,” he says. “My vision was to clean the Gulf and get the people back to the beaches.”

THE REGIONAL operator has embarked on an ongoing investment program, including a $29 million wastewater treatment plant in Thessaloniki.

The difference has been remarkable and the people are indeed flooding back to the beaches, just as Mr. Tsongas intended. With an ongoing investment program in the region’s wastewater infrastructure – including a $29 million Thessaloniki treatment plant, which will have an eventual capacity of 10.5 million cubic feet, enough to handle all of the city’s wastewater – things can only get better.

EYATH is also focused on improving the quality and quantity of drinking water supplies to the area, often supported through large-scale EU development funds.
Indeed, Thessaloniki’s water supply problems will be attended to for the next 25 years or so when the $58 million Aliakmon river reservoir project is fully completed. Other reservoirs and pipelines are planned or under development.
EYATH is working with a British advisory firm, Hyder Consulting, in conjunction with its local partner Vassilis Iossifidis, to improve the operation and management of the overall water supply network. This includes leakage detection work and the design and implementation of a major supervisory control and data acquisition (Scada) scheme as part of its ongoing commitment to modernization. It also means training in state-of-the-art technology for EYATH personnel.

There have already been some marked improvements, including a reduction in network losses from as high as 35 percent down to around 18 percent; in most American and European towns such losses vary between 12-18 percent, according to Mr. Tsongas.
“We have succeeded in diminishing the water shortage problems in the Thessaloniki area,” he says. “Last year was the driest year in the past 50 years, so it was very difficult. But we fulfilled all our requirements with less water.”
Times are changing for EYATH, as it strives for greater efficiency in an increasingly competitive industry. Last year, 25 percent of the company was floated on the Athens Stock Exchange as part of the government’s privatization initiative. The shares have proved a hit with investors, and the company is now one of the largest stocks on the market. Mr. Tsongas says listing on the stock exchange gave the company a boost to the tune of $6 million to help fund development projects.
Encouraged by its success at home, EYATH is now starting to turn its attentions further afield, to the Balkans, in fact.

Mr. Tsongas says that the company is looking to link up with foreign partners to tap the growing potential in the Balkan region. It has already established a Balkan Association of Water Authorities, based in Thessaloniki and headed by Mr. Tsongas himself, with four founding members from Sofia, Belgrade, Skopje and, of course, Thessaloniki. “This will be a very good area for investment,” he says.
With the arrival of development funds from the World Bank and the European Investment Bank, EYATH is well placed to assist other foreign companies to develop business in the region with its local expertise and knowledge.
“EYATH is a leading company in water and wastewater,” he says. “In the near future when the situation stabilizes in these countries, they will be able to use EYATH as an arrowhead.”