Enel’s Anti-Foam Barriers on Lake Ponale Show Promising Results

The first twenty days of testing the anti-foam barriers placed on the surface of the lake directly in front of the Ponale power plant water outlet have yielded very encouraging results.

Although Enel has repeatedly activated the plants, with a significant water flow from the forced pipeline coming from Lake Ledro, foam has, in fact, never appeared.

One might think that the barriers, consisting of a series of panels held at a depth of about one meter and arranged in a belt by a series of rafts, managed to sink the amount of centrifuged microalgae sludge just enough, which is well-known to be the origin of the horrific foam phenomenon observed for days in the Gulf of Riva.

Evaluations and next steps

But Paolo Matteotti, who leads the anti-foam operations, remains cautious. Next week, he will remove the barriers and check whether the foams will return immediately.

If this is the case, it would be clear that the barriers are effective. In this scenario, it would only be necessary to replace the current, admittedly artisanal, barriers with something even safer and more reliable.