HUF 20 Bn to Renew Budapest's Drinking Water Network

The capital's drinking water network will be partially renewed with the help of HUF 20 billion forints of EU funding, Kata Türrő, the Deputy Mayor of Budapest, responsible for the city's management, announced on Wednesday.

She is quoted by MTI as saying that this is the biggest investment in recent decades to improve the quality of drinking water in Budapest, where lead pipes are still in place. Replacing them is a "burning issue", and the program will help to replace 3,000 such connections, he added.

She said the program will also renovate 60 water extraction wells on Szentendre and Csepel islands and renew part of the existing network. To ensure security of supply, the South Pest and South Buda networks will be connected under the Danube.

The Deputy Mayor added that Budapest has about 5,000 kilometers of drinking water network, of which 80 kilometers should be renewed every year, and HUF 80 billion should be spent annually on the reconstruction of the drinking water network.

She stressed that the renewal of the entire network cannot be achieved from the current HUF 20 billion program, and therefore urged that "peace should be made as soon as possible" between the government and the European Union, because without EU funds, no drinking water network reconstruction can be carried out in Hungary today.