The city of Richmond Hill is due to complete its new Sterling Creek wastewater treatment facility in October 2015.
The city has had a rocky road with its wastewater treatment in the past, receiving an honor from the Georgia Municipal Association in 2007, but in 2008 having to settle with the state Environmental Protection Division in order to keep it open due to repeated violations.
It is the EPD that has ordered that the new plant be constructed. According to City Manager Chris Lovell, “Ideally, we wouldn’t have done it, but in order to keep our water permit, we had to.”
Bryan County News reports:
“The membrane bioreactor wastewater treatment plant is the largest single expenditure in Richmond Hill’s history, according to city officials. It will double the city’s capacity to treat wastewater from 1.5 million gallons per day to 3 million and can be expanded to 4 million gallons per day.
“It’s pretty impressive,” Lovell said.
The new plant is being paid for by hikes in water and sewer rates approved by council members in November. Those added $8 a month to the base rate while also billing heavy water users more and increasing connection fees. The first increase took effect in January, and the city will add another increase in 2016.
Without the increases, the city would face a $25 million shortfall in its budget by 2025, officials have said.”
The completion of this new treatment plant will help to solve some of the problems in Richmond Hill’s wastewater system. Careful planning will be needed to maintain the level of operational effectiveness in order to meet water permit conditions.
Inframanage.com notes that for wastewater networks many of the required service levels are set by discharge or water permits, legislation, and regulations.
This is appropriate as water and wastewater networks are vital in the protection of public health.
As a result of service levels being set by permits, legislation, and regulations this leaves infrastructure asset managers little discretion in managing service delivery. The costs of service delivery also have a ‘floor’ that is set by the required service levels.
Similarly, the additional new capital cost for wastewater networks is mostly set by changes in legislation, new environmental discharge standards, or new regulations – as seen in this Richmond Hill example where upgraded treatment processes have been required to meet water permit conditions.
When discussing the lifecycle costs of wastewater networks with elected representatives and the community it is useful to note the mandatory nature of most of the service levels and associated costs.
It is also important to note in these infrastructure asset management discussions that treatment process upgrade cycles are much shorter than pipe network replacement cycles, are generally set by regulation or permit requirements and can add significant additional capital and operational cost when implemented.
PHOTO CREDIT: Photo grabbed from twitter post of Richmondhillnow.com
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