“Tubone”, the first 10 kilometers of pipeline laid.

The Tubone is one of the most important works that will be built in Tuscany, it will allow to better treat one of the most delicate areas of the region, the Fucecchio Marshes.

The new purification scheme of Valdinievole and Basso Valdarno will allow optimal purification at the tanning center of urban wastewater, the achievement of the objectives expected by the European directive on purification and the decommissioning of at least 12 obsolete purification plants, with a significant reduction of energy and management costs.

Valdinievole is an area experiencing a condition of saturation on purification, which is also reflected on the companies.

This intervention will solve this criticality and will also allow the Leather District, one of the main productive districts of Tuscany in the world, to use the purified water avoiding taking it from the aquifer, with a significant benefit in environmental terms. At the same time, the Tuscany Region took charge of ensuring to the Fucecchio Marshes, a very important wetland area, the so-called “minimum vital flow”, that is the guarantee of a supply of water that allows the fauna and flora of these places to live. The whole program agreement has a total investment of 195 million euros, of which about 40 million for the collector.

The Tubone will be made of cast iron, with a diameter of 900 mm and a total length of 24 kilometers, and will "go around" the Fucecchio Marshes starting from the north and arriving in the south at the Aquarno treatment plant. The project was divided into 4 functional lots starting from Santa Croce sull'Arno and ending in Pieve a Nievole. The plants currently in operation along the route (Uggia in Monsummano, Baccane in Larciano, Stabbia in Cerreto Guidi) will be transformed into three sewer lifting stations, which will push the wastewater towards the Santa Croce plant.

Once completed, the Tubone will collect at the Aquarno treatment plant approximately 6.2 million cubic meters of wastewater per year, which will reach more than 9 million cubic meters with the construction of the other important collectors between Pescia, Uzzano and Pieve a Nievole and between Chiesina Uzzanese, Ponte Buggianese and Pieve a Nievole: further 24 kilometers of piping. Once the main work has been completed, it will then be possible to connect the minor purification plants at the east area of Valdinievole.

The Tubone represents the "spearhead" of the program agreement for the protection of water resources in the Valdarno and the Fucecchio Marshes, the so-called “Leather Agreement”.

The Leather Agreement will make it possible to rationalize and make the purification scheme of Valdinievole, Valdera and Valdarno Inferiore more efficient, allowing the transfer of water that is not yet treated at the moment: in other words, the environmental sustainability of the integrated water service will increase and, consequently, the quality of life of citizens.