Diluted liquid manure is apparently now flowing into the Znojmo water reservoir, Jana Kucerova, spokesperson for the state-owned Morava River Basin Authority, told CTK.
However, according to Iva Librova, spokesperson for Vodarenska akciova spolecnost (VAS), the water in Znojmo is still safe to drink. The company does not expect to have to interrupt the supply of drinking water to the town of approximately 34,000 inhabitants, Librova told CTK. Up to 3,000 cubic meters of slurry leaked on Monday from a farm near Podmyce.
The Znojmo water reservoir mainly supplies water to the local water company, which treats it and supplies drinking water to Znojmo and the surrounding villages.
“The water in Znojmo is still safe to drink,” said Librova. “We are monitoring the water quality at the treatment plant more closely than usual, and there is no cause for concern. In addition, the treatment plant is equipped with modern technologies that should be able to cope with even slightly increased levels of pollution. We therefore do not expect any interruption in the supply of drinking water to Znojmo.”
The source of the pollution is about 17 kilometers away from the Znojmo dam, but the Dyje River meanders significantly through the national park. The dangerous ammonia contained in the liquid manure gradually evaporates from the water. The spill is then greatly diluted in the reservoir, which contains about 2.5 million cubic meters of water.
“According to visual monitoring, the front of the spill has apparently already reached the reservoir,” said Kucerova around noon. She added that it is not possible to determine this more precisely because the last sampling point is about two kilometers above the reservoir. The Morava River Basin Authority is trying to secure another sampling point along the reservoir, but the terrain is very inaccessible, especially in winter.
Although the water remains drinkable and the water company does not anticipate any interruption in supply, Znojmo is also preparing for a situation in which the water would temporarily become undrinkable due to the slurry leak. According to town hall spokeswoman Petra Sulakova, this would involve a combination of tankers and deliveries of bottled drinking water, with the deployment of tankers in the streets limited by the freezing weather.
The Morava River Basin Authority monitors the Dyje river, sampling the entire river from the accident site to the Znojmo water reservoir. It is monitoring how quickly and in what concentrations the ammonia is moving towards the water reservoir.
