The operators chosen for the »Supply with drinking water within the Sodražica – Ribnica – Kočevje area« project signed their contracts at today's occasional press conference in Kočevje. Dr. Vladimir Prebilič, the mayor of the Kočevje municipality pointed out the importance of this project for the residents of all three participating municipalities and ceremoniously signed the contracts with the contractor's representatives, i.e. Janez Škrabec the director of the Riko company that is in charge of the water supply network construction, Boris Savnik, the director of the Hidroinženiring company, chosen for the purification plant construction and Branko Vodušek from the Dialog-si.net company, which will be informing the public on the project proceedings and progress. The entire project will be supervised by the Projekt Nova Gorica company.

The leading municipality in this project is the Kočevje municipality, however, the project also involves two other municipalities, i.e. Sodražica and Ribnica. The purpose of the project is to assure reliable, safe and healthy water supplies to the residents of the three involved municipalities, hydraulically improve the water supply network, enable new network connections and ensure proper purification of water on the purification plant. The construction work will start in 2016 and is to be finished in October 2019 with a prior preliminary running.

This project includes the construction of 65,570 meters of water pipes, 11 pumping stations, 4 water towers and 3 purification plants for drinking water. The construction work will be performed in compliance with two contracts, i.e. Drinking water supply in the area of Sodražica – Ribnica – Kočevje: Water supply system (FIDIC Red book) and Drinking water supply in the area of Sodražica – Ribnica – Kočevje: Purification plants (FIDIC Yellow book).

Thanks to this project 25,114 people, who live in the three involved municipalities will be ensured a better and more secure supply with drinking water and 1.312 people will be connected to the public water supply network; 298 in the Kočevje and 1,014 in the Sodražica municipality. This project did not foresee any new water sources, its purpose was merely to preserve the already existing water sources, which are Blate, Slovenska vas, Podstene and the Sodražica bores.