At the beginning of October, Specialists of the Environmental Sector Expert Council of the Employers’ Confederation of Latvia together with environmental engineering educators of vocational schools visited the biological treatment plant “Daugavgrīva” of Rīgas ūdens Ltd with the intention to create a training cycle for environmental engineering educators.

The seminar was attended by the representatives of chemical industry and the council of experts of related industries, the Association of Latvian Water Supply and Sewerage Enterprises, clean technology cluster CLEANTECH LATVIA, Rīgas ūdens Ltd, as well as Water Research Scientific Laboratory of Riga Technical University and EU project PoVE Water.

The water sector in Latvia, similarly as in other European countries, suffers from a great lack of professionally trained specialists. To solve this problem at the European level, Latvian partners are involved in the PoVE Water project, offering nine educators from Olaine College of Technology, Daugavpils Construction Technical School, Vidzeme Technology and Design Technical School, Liepāja State Technical School and Ogre Technical School to get acquainted with the processes at biological treatment plant “Daugavgrīva”.

Māris Zviedris, the head of the wastewater treatment plant, provided an insight into the operation of the largest and most modern water services company in the Baltics, introducing educators to the results achieved in wastewater treatment and sludge treatment, as well as outlining future challenges.

The inspection of the equipment led by Romāns Neilands, Deputy Head of the Wastewater Treatment Plant for Technological Issues, was informative and practically useful for educators. Neilands’ engaging narrative, both at the control panel and at the aero tanks provided educators with insights into the technological processes and allowed assessing the company’s investments in monitoring and automation of technological processes.