Regulating Citywide Inclusive Sanitation (CWIS) in Colombia
Abstract
:1. Introduction
2. Methods
3. Results
3.1. Institutional Framework of the WASH Sector in Colombia
3.2. Understanding Regulatory Barriers through a Policy Review
3.3. Understanding Regulatory Barriers through Expert Views
- Service delivery
- Land Management
- Environmental
- Financial
For example, if municipalities want to invest in those areas where sewerage networks cannot be installed, they cannot use GCS resources, even if they have enough GCS funds, because the law does not allow it. So, that is the problem: there is a disincentive for investment. If municipalities wish to invest in septic systems to extend coverage with alternative solutions, they can do so, but it has to be done with other sources of resources.
- Technical
3.4. Understanding Regulatory Barriers at a Local Level from Tumaco’s Case Study
3.5. Factors That Impede the Development of the Sanitation’s Regulatory Framework
- “You do not manage a city with onsite technologies. You need to manage wastewater. So, you require a service provider that guarantees that will mitigate these effects on the environment”.
- “The ideal situation is, of course, a centralised solution because you need to conduct wastewater and take it to a place to treat it and comply with the environmental law”.
- “In Colombia, onsite solutions are only implemented and suited for rural contexts”.
4. Discussion
4.1. Does the Current Regulatory Framework Enable CWIS?
“I am not familiar with those technologies [referring to non-conventional alternatives], within what I have managed in Agua al Barrio programme, which is the programme of differentiated schemes that is part of Decree 1272- 2017. I have not had the experience. The other types of individual solutions are more provisional and are things developed by the community itself to provide a solution for wastewater management, but…so far, we have not had a structured solution of this type”.
4.2. Nuances in the Results
4.3. What Is the Way Forward?
5. Conclusions
Supplementary Materials
Author Contributions
Funding
Institutional Review Board Statement
Informed Consent Statement
Data Availability Statement
Conflicts of Interest
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Organisation | Number of Interviewees | Number of Participants in 4 Workshops | Scale |
---|---|---|---|
Ministry of Housing, City and Territory | 3 | 6 | National |
Water Regulatory Commission | 4 | - | National |
Superintendence of Public Utilities | 1 | - | National |
Tumaco WASH Project Manager | 2 | - | Local |
National Planning Department | 1 | 3 | National |
Water and Sanitation Guild | 2 | - | National |
Development Bank | 1 | 2 | National & Local |
Academia | - | 2 | National |
Independent WASH Consultant | 1 | - | National |
Community-based Utility | 1 | - | Local |
Local NGO | 1 | - | Local |
Total | 17 | 13 |
Service Provision | Environmental | Land Management | Financial | Technical | |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
Constitution | Art. 49. The State is responsible for environmental sanitation and granting every person access to public services Art. 334. The State must intervene progressively to ensure that the most vulnerable people have access to essential services Art. 365. Public services are inherent to the social purpose of the State that must ensure its efficient provision to all inhabitants of the national territory | ||||
Law | Law 142-1994: defines sanitation as the municipal collection of residues, primarily liquids, through pipes and channels, the complementary activities of transportation, and final disposal of such residues. Law 1753-2015: defines a differentiated scheme for service provision and establishes three zones where these can be applied: zones of difficult access, complex management, or low connectivity. These schemes must comply with what is contained in the 142-1994 law. | Law 2811-1974: National Code of renewable resources and the protection of the environment. | Law 388-1997: LGs determine the territory’s distribution and organisation and establish a service area for WSS service provision. LG cannot provide public services in non-mitigable risk areas. Law 136-1994: states that LGs must deliver WSS services in the whole urban permitter Law 2044-2020: aims to solve the precarious situation of informal/illegal human settlements in urban contexts by instructing the municipalities to reach those settlements with services and solve their informal condition. | Law 1176-2007: Creates the GCS pot destined to be used by LGs for education, health, water and sanitation projects. Specifies that GCS investments must comply with what is contained in the 142-1994 law. (Art. 10-11). | Law 1955-2019: WSS solutions can be collective or individual under the figure of a differentiated scheme. |
Decree | Dec 302-2000 1: establishes the conditions to provide a public service. Dec 1898-2016: establishes an exception to Law 142 by allowing different technologies to be implemented. Nevertheless, alternative technologies do not fall under the service provision model and are excluded from subsidies. Dec 1272-2017: regulates service delivery in urban areas under special conditions that require a differentiated scheme. All the solutions must follow technical parameters contained in Res 0330-2017 Dec 1688-2020: non-conventional solutions are not subject to Law 142/94. Public utilities can operate non-conventional infrastructure only through a direct contract between the utility company and the user, which is not subject to subsidies. Dec 1471-2021: regulates conditions to connect buildings to water and sanitation utilities in urban areas | Dec 1287-2014 2: regulates the use of sludge generated from wastewater treatment plants but does not include biosolids from other sources (onsite solutions) Dec 1541-1978: specifies that a land discharge permit must be obtained from the environmental authority to implement onsite sanitation solutions. | Dec 1688-2020: CGS resources can be used to finance studies and designs that include non-conventional solutions but not infrastructure. | Dec 1688-2020: states that onsite solutions can be applied in rural areas that require them, but does not mention urban areas | |
Resolution | Res 688-2014: defines a framework for WSS service delivery under normal conditions. Res 949-2021: defines a special service delivery framework for cases in which companies cannot comply with the efficiency parameters due to particular conditions. It includes a social factor in the tariff and allows for phased progress until the particular conditions are solved. | Res 631-2015: establishes requirements of land discharge permits for sewered sanitation Res 699-2021: establishes the requirements of the land discharge permit for onsite sanitation. Res 1256-2021: establishes requirements to allow wastewater re-use in agriculture | Res 066-2019: establishes the conditions to approve WSS projects contesting for national funds (GRS and NGB). | Res 330-2017: establishes technical parameters for WSS infrastructure. It details technical parameters for conventional technologies but briefly discusses non-conventional. Res 779-2021: changes technical requirements for conventional systems, condominial sewerage and onsite solutions. New technologies require approval from an accredited certification body. | |
Court ruling | T 012-19: Supreme court ruled that domestic public utilities are defined as those provided through a system of physical or human networks with terminal points at the users’ homes or workplaces and have the specific purpose of satisfying people’s needs. |
Capture | Collection/Emptying | Collection/Transport | Treatment | Disposal/Re-Use | |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
Service Provider | Sewered systems and onsite solutions: house owners are responsible for building the facilities following technical requirements. | Sewered systems: utility companies (piped systems). Onsite solutions: contracted public utilities or private operators for emptying services. | Sewered systems: utility companies (piped systems). Onsite solutions: contracted public utilities or private operators for transport services. | Sewered systems: utility companies treat effluent in water treatment plants (Res 631/2015) and collect biosolids for re-use or disposal (Dec 1287-2014) | Sewered systems: utility companies treat and collect biosolids for re-use or disposal (Dec 1287-2014) coming from WTP |
GAP | Onsite solutions: lack of technical standards and guidelines for onsite sanitation alternatives. | Onsite solutions: the service delivery model does not consider faecal sludge emptying | Onsite solutions: the service delivery model does not consider faecal sludge transport. | Onsite solutions: disposal of treated effluent in landfills is mandatory. So, faecal sludge is not treated. | Technical standards are too strict for small-scale utilities |
Financier of Facility | Sewered systems and onsite solutions: households in most of the cases. Sometimes, LG and AECs can support through neighbourhood/household improvement projects | Sewered systems: utility companies with local or national government financial support. Onsite solutions: utility companies or private operators | Sewered systems: utility companies with local or national government financial support. Onsite solutions: utility companies or private operators | Utility companies, the national government through MHCT or LG | Utility companies, the national government through MHCT or LG |
GAP | Onsite solutions: limited financial resources for onsite sanitation programs. | Onsite solutions: GCS resources cannot be used for non-conventional sanitation technologies like vacuum tankers. | Onsite solutions: GCS cannot be used for the construction of non-conventional sanitation treatment technologies | ||
Regulator | Municipalities regulate technical parameters of household sanitary facilities, and AECs regulate effluent discharge for onsite sanitation | Sewered systems: SPU supervises the performance of utility companies. | Sewered systems: SPU oversees the performance of utility companies. | Sewered systems: SPU supervises the performance of utility companies and the correct application of tariffs. AECs regulate the effluent discharge | AECs regulate utility companies through environmental permits to centralised systems. |
GAP | Regulations are not often enforced as AECs and LG lack the capacity. | Faecal sludge emptying is not regulated. Lack of guidelines and mechanisms to control private vacuum tankers | Faecal sludge transportation is not regulated. Lack of guidelines and mechanisms to control private vacuum tankers | Lack of guidelines for faecal sludge treatment processes. These are discharged into landfills without treatment | Faecal sludge re-use and disposal coming from non-sewered solutions are not regulated. |
Regulatory Instrument | Onsite solutions: construction licenses required by municipalities and a discharge authorisation given by the AECs | Sewered systems: registering the utility company for SPU control | Sewered systems: registering the utility company for SPU control | Sewered systems: discharge permits (AECs) and discharge sanitation plan for decentralised and centralised WWTP. | Registering biosolids characteristics and quantity in the AECs |
GAP | Discharge permits for onsite sanitation technologies are too strict | No regulatory instruments for vacuum tankers | No regulations for faecal sludge treatment from onsite solutions | Regulations only for faecal sludge coming from WWTP | |
Payer of the Service | Household | Sewered systems: tariffs, depending on the income level, can be partially subsidised. Onsite solutions: Household | Sewered systems: tariffs, depending on the income level, can be partially subsidised. | Sewered systems: WSS service providers, municipalities in some cases. | |
GAP | No subsidies are available for faecal sludge emptying, transportation, treatment and disposal. |
Type | Barriers |
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General |
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Service Delivery |
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Land Management |
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Environmental |
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Financial |
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Technical |
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Saker, A.; Bernal Pedraza, A.; Narayan, A.S. Regulating Citywide Inclusive Sanitation (CWIS) in Colombia. Int. J. Environ. Res. Public Health 2022, 19, 5669. https://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph19095669
Saker A, Bernal Pedraza A, Narayan AS. Regulating Citywide Inclusive Sanitation (CWIS) in Colombia. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health. 2022; 19(9):5669. https://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph19095669
Chicago/Turabian StyleSaker, Analía, Andrea Bernal Pedraza, and Abishek Sankara Narayan. 2022. "Regulating Citywide Inclusive Sanitation (CWIS) in Colombia" International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health 19, no. 9: 5669. https://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph19095669