Joint International Conference on Long-term Experiments ...

REGIONAL DEVELOPMENT USING CONSTRUCTED WETLANDS FOR
WASTEWATER TREATMENT IN VALEA IERULUI (ÉRMELLÉK) REGION
Botond L. Pete
City Hall of Oradea
P-ţa Unirii nr. 1, Oradea, Romania
ABSTRACT
Valea Ierului (Érmellék) lays one the Romania - Hungary border region, and joins the
settlements of the two country sides. As the level of development is not too high in the
region, new solutions are needed to be found, especially in the domain of the
wastewater treatment. The most suitable solution for communal wastewater treatment
should be the epuration with constructed wetlands, because this technology is less
expensive then the classic methods, and it makes possible to save funds by making
smaller investments. Using this technology, the saved funds can be returned and used in
other projects in the concerning of regional development. The most suitable wetland
plants that can be used in the region are the Phragmites australis (communis),
Schoenoplectus lacustris, Typha latifolia.
Keywords: regional development, Valea Ierului, wastewater treatment, constructed
wetlands
INTRODUCTION
One of the major problems of Europe became the issue of wastewater treatment in the
local communities. The irreversible growth of the cities results in a higher water
consumption and the increase of the wastewater quantity. Due to the national increase of
the Romanian life standards more wastewater treatment systems will be needed and this
fact will raise more problems for the local authorities. Starting with the year of 2007
every village with more than 2000 citizens, must have an adequate wastewater treatment
system. In the same time, the increasing use of chemical substances, in special those
from the domestic use, make necessary the modernization of the purification plants. The
building of a modern infrastructure is very expensive, and the major part of the small
communities does not have the necessary financial resources.
A short presentation of Valea Ierului (Érmellék) Region
Valea Ierului (Érmellék) area can be defined as a region between the foothills of the
Occidental Carpathians, the Bükk, Meszes and the Réz-hegység Mountains, and the
Tisza’s lowland. The bigger part of the region is represented by the Sălaj (Szilágy) and
Bihor (Bihar) counties from Romania and just a smaller part belongs to Hungary. On
the north side it is bordered by the Crasna’s basin, on the east side by the hills of Sălaj
county, on south by the valley of Barcău (Berettyó) river. The town of Săcuieni
(Székelyhíd) can be considered the geographical center of the region.
Valea Ierului (Érmellék) as a region was described in more research studies, but
the geographical limits were not established exactly until now. Some of the specialists
consider that Valea Ierului (Érmellék) is such a region that includes Tasnad (Tasnad)
and the others claim that Carei (Nagykaroly) is also included. According to this theory
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