Pittsburgh Water & Sewer Authority extends partnership with Veolia
The Pittsburgh Water & Sewer Authority Board of Directors voted to continue a nearly three-year partnership with Veolia North America. Since 2012, the partnership has secured more than $5 million annually in financial benefit, delivered operational efficiencies and made PWSA a leader in green infrastructure, according to Veolia. The one-year contract extension to December 2015 allows PWSA and Veolia to continue a long-term strategy to improve customer service, reduce spending, increase efficiency, overcome financial challenges, and protect water quality and the environment. The partnership is part of Veolia’s Peer Performance Solutions model, enabling utilities to benchmark against other leading utilities while preserving public governance and a public workforce.
East Orange County Water District selects Sedaru software
IDModeling has been selected by California’s East Orange County Water District to deploy Sedaru software to connect various systems. The software helps industry professionals anticipate water operations, understand impacts and solve problems for energy, quality, water resource and asset management initiatives. The software will allow district personnel to call up current customer data and historical maintenance data in the field on a tablet, eliminating paperwork. The district will also be able to leverage hydraulic modeling data and run scenarios before performing actions, such as which valve to close in an emergency.
South San Francisco trash trucks operate on biogas
South San Francisco trash trucks now operate on compressed natural gas made from anaerobic digester biogas. South San Francisco Scavenger Company, which serves San Francisco International Airport along with the cities of South San Francisco, Brisbane and Millbrae, has partnered with a facility that converts food scraps to fuel. The digester processes 11,200 tons of compostable materials a year, producing the equivalent of up to 55 gpd of diesel fuel daily. The process also yields digestate that can be converted into compost.
United Water signs 20-year agreement with Nassau County, N.Y.
United Water signed an agreement with officials of Nassau County for a 20-year contract to operate, manage and maintain the county’s wastewater treatment plants, pumping stations and sewers. The system handles and treats wastewater from 1.2 million people on Long Island. It is the largest water-related public-private partnership in the United States with a value of more than $1.2 billion, according to the company. Nassau County will invest more than $830 million in its sewer system over the next several years. United Water will aim to improve the system’s operating efficiency and performance on environmental standards; clean discharges to meet state regulatory standards; and eliminate odors from three treatment plants. United Water will guarantee cost savings of more than $230 million during the contract.
Palmdale Water District awards 10-year contract to Calgon Carbon
Calgon Carbon Corporation and Palmdale Water District (Calif.) signed a 10-year contract under which Calgon Carbon will provide reactivation services to treat the district’s drinking water. The district uses granular-activated carbon to meet the U.S. EPA Stage 2 Disinfectants and Disinfection Byproducts Rule. The district will convert to Calgon’s high-performance Filtrasorb400 GAC, which when spent will be taken to the company’s facility in Gila Bend, Ariz., for custom reactivation.
Arizona’s Pima County signs contract with Anaergia
Anaergia and project partner Grannus Biogas contracted with the Pima County (Ariz.) Regional Wastewater Reclamation Department to design, build, finance, own and operate a biomethane upgrading facility. Solids from the department’s nine wastewater treatment plants are handled in a central site at the Tres Rios Water Reclamation Facility in Marana. Anaerobic digestion of biosolids yields biomethane that the new upgrading facility will treat and compress for use in place of nonrenewable fossil fuels.
Neptune Benson ETS-UV added to drinking-water facility in Berea, Ohio
Neptune Benson installed a UV drinking-water disinfection system in Berea, Ohio, enabling the city to seek a Cryptosporidium credit. The city uses surface water drawn from the East Branch of the Rocky River but can also draw from Coe Lake and Baldwin Creek. These open-water sources are vulnerable to runoff and other contamination. The city chose the Neptune Benson ETS-UV systems after an evaluation of UV suppliers.
American Water wins new contract for Picatinny Arsenal
American Water Works Company won a contract for ownership, operation and maintenance of water and the wastewater systems at Picatinny Arsenal, N.J., worth an estimated $297 million over 50 years. Located about 35 miles west of New York City, Picatinny employs about 3,900 civilians, 100 military personnel and 1,000 contractors, about half of them engineers and scientists. The installation specializes in the research, development, acquisition and life-cycle management of advanced conventional weapon systems and advanced ammunition.
CDM Smith to implement biosolids improvements at Trinity River Authority
The Trinity River Authority in Texas selected CDM Smith to design comprehensive biosolids improvements at its 162 mgd Central Regional Wastewater System in Dallas. In addition to new anaerobic digestion and ancillary processes, the project will incorporate thermal hydrolysis to produce Class A biosolids for safe, flexible land application at multiple outlets. The company will also provide the authority with owner’s advisory services for construction management.
DC Water to receive world’s largest deammonification system and thermal hydrolysis process
World Water Works will supply its DEMON deammonification process technology to DC Water’s Blue Plains treatment facility. It will be the world’s largest anammox-based treatment system. The DEMON biological process removes high amounts of nitrogen from water, using 60 percent less energy and producing 90 percent less sludge than traditional nitrogen-removal processes, according to the company, and does not use methanol. The technology has a small carbon footprint and sequesters carbon dioxide. A biomass separation device maintains appropriate levels of ammonia oxidizing bacteria and anaerobic ammonium oxidizing (anammox) bacteria, both key to the low-energy, no-chemical process. The installation is part of a new solids processing facility at Blue Plains. A Cambi thermal hydrolysis process (THP) designed and built by CDM Smith and PC Construction Company in a joint venture is now operating at DC Water’s Blue Plains advanced wastewater treatment plant. The system is the first of its kind in the United States and the largest Cambi system in the world. The THP system is part of Blue Plains’ updated biosolids main process train, which includes new facilities for biosolids blending and screening, pre-dewatering and four 3.8-million-gallon anaerobic digesters. The process yields Class A biosolids and allows generation of power from biogas while significantly reducing the volume of biosolids hauled away. The project is projected to reduce costs by $10 million for electricity and $10 million for solids handling.
Titusville awards contract for disc filter system
Veolia Water Technologies won a contract with the City of Titusville, Fla., to furnish a Hydrotech Discfilter system as part of the Osprey Water Reclamation Facility Headworks and Filter Improvements project. Veolia will supply two filter units with PLC controls designed to provide an average effluent TSS concentration of less than 5 mg/L and capable of filtering a peak flow of 4.125 mgd per filter unit.
Ottawa cleantech firm wins two wastewater deals worth $2 million
BluMetric Environmental won two contracts worth a combined $2 million for wastewater treatment installations in Ontario and Kentucky. The company’s water division won a contract to supply an onsite wastewater treatment system for a new housing development near the Greater Toronto Area. The system includes ROTORDISK rotating biological contactors technology with denitrification and phosphorus-removal capability. Under the second contract, the company will supply specialized wastewater treatment equipment for a multinational firm in Carrollton, Ky.
