The Valparaiso Environmental Assessment Commission (COEVA by its Spanish acronym) unanimously approved Las Salinas land remediation project. This will allow the recovery process of the 16-hectare patch located in the northern area of Viña del Mar, which has already undergone a first stage of remediation between 2008 and 2013, to be completed.

For the final sanitation, the bioremediation technique will be used, through which natural processes are accelerated for an effective and safe degradation of compounds, by means of microorganisms natively present in the land. For these purposes, an extensive analysis and characterization of the terrain was carried out for more than 15 years, more than 1,100 soil and water samples were collected, and more than 30,000 analyzes were carried out in top-level laboratories in Canada, the United States and Chile.

The company will invest around US$ 55 million for the sanitation works.

In addition to the scientific and technical value of this experience of recovering land with an industrial past, the future urban project to be located in Las Salinas seeks to create high social, urban and economic impact, in a context where sustainable reactivation gains growing importance for the citizenship.

Additionally, according to the report “Socioeconomic impact assessment of the Las Salinas master plan for Greater Valparaiso,” prepared by the Adolfo Ibáñez University, the gross value of the economic impact that the Las Salinas neighborhood will have once the project is completed, would reach US$ 2.12 billion. In terms of employment, the construction phase will create an estimated thousand jobs per year.

“As international experience has proven, the conversion of land used for industrial activities are projects of enormous environmental and urban value. Once the last recovery stage of the Las Salinas land is completed, it will be incorporated into the urban development of Viña del Mar in the form of the first certified sustainable neighborhood in Chile (and third in the world), generating a new centrality in the city,” said Inmobiliaria Las Salinas Development Manager, Esteban Undurraga.