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Semarang to build polder to tackle floods
To deal with recurrent flooding due to a local high tide, known as the rob, the Semarang administration in Central Java is cooperating with Dutch company Hoogheemraadschap van Scieland en de Krimpenerwaard (HHSK) to build a polder in the Banger River
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o deal with recurrent flooding due to a local high tide, known as the rob, the Semarang administration in Central Java is cooperating with Dutch company Hoogheemraadschap van Scieland en de Krimpenerwaard (HHSK) to build a polder in the Banger River.
Semarang Mayor Hendrar Prihadi said the polder, a flood-control system using dikes, would be built in East Semarang district. The Rp 84 billion (US$6.9 million) project is expected to be finished by September 2014, after having been in abeyance since 2001.
The polder will cover a plot of 530 hectares in 10 subdistricts in East Semarang. There will be five pump houses, four for routine operations with the extra one as back-up.
Each pump will have a capacity of 1.5 cubic meters of water per second. The pumps are expected to be able to lower the level of the river to 2 meters below its current level.
Roy Kraft Van Ermel of HHSK said his country had 850 years of experience in managing water. The polder system in the Banger River, he said, would be the first in Southeast Asia and was expected to be the right solution for Semarang.
He said that around 80,000 residents would be protected from flooding once the project was finished. Van Ermel said that the superiority of a polder system was in its management, which required active participation by local people, the business sector and the government.
For local people, he said, the polder was advantageous because the price of property in the region would increase and residents would no longer need to elevate their houses every year.
