Ruhrverband
| Ruhrverband | |
|---|---|
|
|
| legal form | Public corporation |
| purpose | Procure and provide water for drinking and industrial water supply as well as for the use of hydropower, regulate and balance water runoff, secure flood runoff and purify wastewater |
| Seat | Essen , North Rhine-Westphalia |
| founding | June 5, 1913
|
| Board | Norbert Jardin, Antje Mohr |
| Members | 559 |
| Employee | 940 (in full-time equivalents) |
| Website | www.ruhrverband.de |
The Ruhrverband (RV) is a corporation under public law and the largest of the eleven special water management associations in North Rhine-Westphalia . According to the law, it is not a local authority and serves the common good and the benefit of its members. As part of the river basin management he fulfills the tasks of water quantity and water quality management in the whole of the construction and operation of dams and sewage catchment area of the Ruhr true. The RV employs 960 people and is based in Essen . As a not-for-profit company, it collects contributions from its members for its water management tasks as part of an assessment .
Duties of the Ruhr Association
The drinking and industrial water supply of around 4.6 million people in the Sauerland and Ruhr area is based on sufficient water supply from the Ruhr and its tributaries. The water from the Ruhr is used for artificial groundwater recharge , so that it is only then processed into drinking water. In order to ensure the water supply in the entire region, even in dry seasons, the RV operates eight dams in the Sauerland with a total storage volume of 463 million cubic meters.
Another main task of the Ruhrverband is wastewater treatment for the 2.2 million people and various companies in the catchment area. The water polluted with faeces, food residues, dissolved carbon, nitrogen and phosphorus compounds as well as the residues of pre-treated industrial wastewater is collected in the municipal sewerage system and cleaned in one of the 65 sewage treatment plants of the RV . This means that the waterworks on the Ruhr can be provided with good quality Ruhr water . In the early years of the RV , when the cleaning performance of the RV sewage treatment plants was not as high as it is today, the Ruhr reservoirs were created to improve the water quality and are now used more for recreational purposes.
In total, the Ruhrverband operates around 1,000 water management systems in the 4,485 square kilometer catchment area of the Ruhr to fulfill its tasks. In addition to the dams and sewage treatment plants, there are five reservoirs and various water management systems such as return pumping stations , water levels, rainwater treatment systems , pumping stations and online measuring stations for monitoring the water quality . An overview of the dams and Ruhr reservoirs can be found in the navigation bars below . A list of RV sewage treatment plants (as of 2018) can be obtained from the Ruhrverband.
The tasks are described in detail in the Act on the Ruhr Association ( Ruhrverband law - governed dated 7 February 1990 (RuhrVG) § 2 RuhrVG ):
- Regulation of water runoff including balancing the water flow and securing the flood runoff of surface waters or sections of water and in their catchment areas;
- Maintenance of surface waters or sections of water and the facilities functionally related to them;
- Return of developed surface waters to a near-natural state;
- Avoidance, reduction, elimination and compensation of water management and related ecological changes caused or expected adverse changes caused by effects on the groundwater level;
- Procurement and provision of water for drinking and industrial water supply and for the exploitation of hydropower;
- Wastewater disposal in accordance with the State Water Act;
- Disposal of the waste generated during the performance of the association's tasks;
- Avoidance, reduction, elimination and compensation of adverse changes in the surface water that have occurred or are expected to be caused by wastewater discharges or other causes;
- Determination of the water management conditions, insofar as the association's tasks require it.
Some of these tasks have not (yet) been assigned to the Ruhrverband and will continue to be fulfilled by those previously obliged to do so until the association takes over them.
| Ruhrverband key figures | |
|---|---|
| Ruhr catchment area | 4,485 km² |
| Ruhr river length | 219 km |
| medium discharge | 70.4 m³ / s |
| Total watercourses | approx. 7,000 km |
| Population (E) total | 2.05 million euros |
| Operating facilities | |
| Dams | 8th |
| Total traffic jam | 462.9 million m³ |
| Ruhr reservoirs | 5 |
| Total traffic jam | 19.1 million m³ |
| Sewage treatment plants | 64 |
| Cleaning capacity | 3.187 million euros |
| Total wastewater volume | 311 million m³ / year |
| Rain basin | 558 |
| Pumping stations | 17th |
| Hydropower plants | 17th |
Dam control center
Through an addition in the RuhrVG, target values for the water flow of the Ruhr are quantified. According to this, the progressive arithmetic mean of five successive daily values should not fall below a value of 15 m³ / s at the Hattingen gauge and a value of 8.4 m³ / s at the Villigst gauge . It is also specified that the lowest daily value for the discharge below the Hattingen gauge should not fall below 13 m³ / s and at the Villigst gauge 7.5 m³ / s. In individual cases, exceptions can be permitted in coordination with the supervisory authority - as happened in the last few years of dry weather. As a result, the water released by the dams can be reduced in order to conserve or stretch the stored water supplies.
To meet these requirements and to limit the effects of floods, the RV has set up the Ruhr dam control center in Essen . From there, the control and management of the dam system takes place on the basis of RV's own water levels and precipitation measuring stations . The always up-to-date data is transferred online to Essen and is incorporated into water management forecast models . These form the decision-making basis for operational dam control.
Association area
The association area includes the above-ground catchment area of the Ruhr in the state of North Rhine-Westphalia, which has its source in the Hochsauerland. It extends from Duisburg in the west to Brilon in the east. The northern border runs through the southern parts of the large Ruhr area cities, which lie directly on the northern slope of the Ruhr Valley, and along the southern edge of the Haarstrang in Westphalia . To the south, the association area extends to a line from Olpe to Winterberg . The most water-rich tributary is the Lenne , which also has its origins in the Rothaar Mountains and flows into the Ruhr near Hagen .
Members
According to the cooperative principle , all cities, municipalities and districts in the association area are members of the association. In addition, this includes companies and other public water supply providers in the association's area who pump water as groundwater for the purpose of using it, take it from surface waters or take it from the association's facilities. Commercial companies, property owners and operators of traffic systems with relevant benefits from the work of the RV are also members.
The Ruhr Association currently consists of 559 association members (60 municipalities, 80 water drawers and 419 commercial companies) in the Ruhr river basin. You manage the RV , which is under the legal supervision of the State of North Rhine-Westphalia . The association assembly with 152 delegates is the highest body. The association council is formed from ten association members and five employee representatives and takes on the supervisory function of the management of the two-person executive board.
In the implementation of water management tasks, the RV is both a partner and service provider for its members. The members have to make the contributions to the association, which are necessary for the fulfillment of its tasks and duties, its obligations and for a proper economic management, as far as other income is not sufficient to cover the expenditures of the association. The amount of the contributions to be paid depends on the amount of water withdrawn or the dirt loads introduced.
The history of the Ruhr Association
Historically, the two main tasks - water drainage control and wastewater treatment - were separate and organized in two separate associations. The need to found the water board arose from the development of the region between the Ruhr and Emscher from a rural area with a low population density to the center of German heavy industry . The expanding industry and the rapidly growing population led to a leap in water consumption along the Ruhr, so that in dry summers, especially in the river sections below, there was a threatening water shortage, which in some cases even brought industrial production to a standstill.
Out of the water emergency, the Ruhrtalsperrenverein (RTV), initially privately organized, was the first association to emerge in 1899 as an association of water and engine operators for whom sufficient water flow in the Ruhr was a prerequisite. Just five years later, the RTV had made substantial grants for four dams , which had a total storage space of 16 million cubic meters . However, this was by far not enough to solve the big problems and the planning of the first own dam in the Möhnetal began . In 1913 the Möhne dam went into operation with 130 million m³ of storage volume.
The increasing industrial and domestic water consumption inevitably also resulted in a higher volume of wastewater, which was discharged into the rivers uncleared. This inadequate wastewater disposal and the drinking water that became infected from it led to a deterioration in the hygienic conditions and epidemics repeatedly spread in the Ruhr area. However, the administrative responsibilities hampered a comprehensive fight against the causes. The 1904 law on the formation of a cooperative to regulate the drainage and waste water purification in the Emscher area offered an overarching solution.
On this basis, the special law to create the Ruhr Association was passed in 1913. As a public water association, it had the task of building and operating sewage treatment plants to keep the Ruhr area clean. The same law also gave the Ruhrtalsperrenverein status under public law and the task of ensuring adequate water drainage in the Ruhr through the construction and operation of dams. The public-law form of organization aims to involve all “water users” equally in the cost-effective measures.
On July 1, 1990, the Ruhrtalsperrenverein and the Ruhrverband were merged into a water management association, which bears the name Ruhrverband .
Web links
- Literature by and about Ruhrverband in the catalog of the German National Library
- Official website
- Early documents and newspaper articles on the Ruhrverband in the 20th century press kit of the ZBW - Leibniz Information Center for Economics .
- Report on the dams of the Ruhr Association in the Westfalenspiegel (PDF file; 256 kB)
- Dam control center Ruhr
Individual evidence
- ↑ Board of Directors. Ruhrverband, accessed on January 25, 2020 .
- ↑ The Ruhr Association's dam system. Ruhrverband, accessed on January 25, 2020 .
- ↑ sewage treatment plants. Ruhrverband, accessed on January 25, 2020 .
- ↑ a b c Facts & Figures. Retrieved August 3, 2017 .
- ↑ Table A: Master data of the facilities of the Ruhr Association 2018. Sewage treatment plants. Ruhrverband, 2018, accessed on January 25, 2020 .
- ↑ Draft law on the formation of a cooperative to regulate the drainage and waste water treatment in the Emscher area, including the reasons . Essen 1903, urn : nbn: de: hbz: 6: 1-199528 ( Download from University of Münster [PDF; accessed on January 25, 2020]).
