Brazil Raises CERTOH Certification Threshold for Federal Water Projects to BRL 60 Million

en.Wedoany.com Reported - On September 10, Brazil's National Water and Sanitation Agency (ANA) issued Normative Ordinance No. 573/2026, raising the minimum investment threshold for projects requiring the Water Engineering Sustainability Assessment Certificate (CERTOH) from BRL 56,424,500 to BRL 60,018,133. The new standard takes effect on October 1, 2026, and applies to raw water storage and conveyance infrastructure built or financed wholly or partially with federal funds.

This adjustment implements the annual update mechanism established by Brazilian Presidential Decree No. 12,478/2025. The decree provides that the minimum amount for projects subject to CERTOH shall be adjusted annually according to the National Construction Cost Index (INCC), with ANA publishing the new amount standard by October each year. In 2025, the threshold was BRL 56,424,500, and in 2026 it was raised to BRL 60,018,133, an increase of approximately BRL 3,577,300, or about 6.34%.

CERTOH applies to raw water storage and conveyance water infrastructure built or financed with federal funds. Under the revised system in 2025, the scope of certification is no longer limited to voluntary transfers from the federal government to state and municipal governments, but has been expanded to all types of federal fund transfers. Relevant water projects meeting the monetary threshold are required to undergo ANA's sustainability assessment when entering the federal funding support and project implementation stages.

In its CERTOH review, ANA primarily assesses the project's water resource sustainability and the conditions for subsequent operation of the works, including whether the project can improve the level of water resource utilization in its basin and whether institutional arrangements are in place to ensure sustained operation of the works. The certification does not target all water projects, but rather those meeting the specified amount, using federal funds, and constituting raw water storage or conveyance infrastructure.

The 2025 institutional adjustment also raised the previously long-standing threshold of BRL 10 million first to BRL 55 million, and established a mechanism for annual adjustment according to INCC. The annual adjustment value actually implemented from October 1, 2025 was BRL 56,424,500, and the current Ordinance No. 573/2026 establishes the new implementation standard for the following year.

ANA continues to carry out certification of specific projects under this system. In March 2026, the ANA Board of Directors approved CERTOH certification for the Agreste Potiguar water conveyance system in Rio Grande do Norte, Brazil, demonstrating that the certificate has been practically applied in the approval of large-scale water conveyance infrastructure involving federal funds.