WADESBORO — Anson County’s compromised water system and aging pipes continued to be a focus of county commissioners last Tuesday, at the only board meeting held for the month of July.
Hazen and Sawyer’s Vice President David Briley apprised commissioners of the Water Treatment Plant Filter Rehabilitation project’s goals.
The county selected Hazen and Sawyer to address Anson County’s water quality challenges while creating a tailored solution that delivers lasting benefits to the community’s water and sewer systems.
Briley acknowledged the rehabilitation project launched in response to “two of the filters at the water treatment plant [being] out of service due to some significant leakage.”
Providing a brief history, Briley said, “That plant has got eight filters, the first set dates back to the late 60’s and late 80’s. Filters five through eight were constructed in the early 90’s and that set of filters is where you got two of them that are currently out of service due to some leakage.”
Briley said repairs include “replacing media, dealing with those kind of structural issues and fixing the leak repair in several filters that will require under drain replacement, backwash troughs, as well as some flood gates and motor actuators, and reconfiguring some of the air piping.”
Briley added half of the filters currently in use have the capability for air scour, which is more effective for cleaning the media. As the older filters do not have this ability, part of this project will be getting these filters updated. Another key feature of the project expected to provide significant benefit is connecting the east side of the plant to the west side of the plant.
Breaking down the cost of the project, Briley estimates the total project cost will be around $9 million to complete all the needed repairs Hazen and Sawyer have identified. Hazen and Sawyer will be opening the projects up to bids, and have itemized project needs in order of import, in case there turns out to not be enough funding available to address all of the aging water system’s repairs at once.
Briley confirmed Hazen and Sawyer submitted a completed design back in May to the state for permitting as well as to the North Carolina Public Water Supply and to the Infrastructure Authority.
“That is where we are at right now, awaiting comments, review, and approval from those two agencies,” Briley said.
He added his hope that “we can advertise [for bids] towards the end of August.”
Moving on to the county’s drinking water woes, Briley stated, “The county received the American Rescue Plan Act grant for this work. It has been ongoing and we expect to have it completely wrapped up by the end of the year.”
One big piece of that, according to Briley, is conducting a comprehensive evaluation of the conditions of the water treatment plant’s systems. This will determine how well the plant is operating, and its performance levels, while identifying any additional needs that may be uncovered through the assessment process.
The revised Water Treatment Plant report will include assessments in hydraulic analysis, operational, maintenance and safety evaluations, structural, electrical, I&C evaluation and a water demand audit.
“Once we have identified the needs, [we will] conduct a rate study to see what the impact would be on rates from the work. There is also a hydrant inventory as a piece of that, which is being conducted as a part of some of the lead and copper work,” Briley said.
Feeding into the rate study is the knowledge that the Observational Study Monitoring Board, or OSMB, is projecting for Anson County to continue showing a slight decline in its population over the next 20 years. Another worry mentioned by Briley, is related to the decrease in wholesale water sales by neighboring Richmond and Union Counties in North Carolina, as well as a decrease in Anson County’s wholesale water sales to Chesterfield, Co. in South Carolina.
“The water sales in the production of that treatment plant is for wholesale uses, which took a step back with Union County backing off of their sales. They were purchasing a lot of water, and they have now completed their own project, so they have an additional supply. Basically the bottom line is that we are projecting water use to be maximum day, peak water usage, would be about 12.0 MGD (Millions of Gallons per Day) over the next 20 years.”
Briley explained, “It is really that peak day water demand that drives treatment plant capacity.”
Providing insight into cost, Briley said, “Probably each system has some level of rehabilitation that is needed. There is certainly a strong need to have integration for the chemical system, [which is] essentially the computer controlled system at a treatment plant. We took needs and broke them up into a couple of categories, one, here is some work that needs to be done if we need to get ten more years of life out of this plant. Maybe the county is thinking about replacing this facility. Or, if we are looking at this treatment plant, we are going to reinvest in it, fix the things that need fixing.”
Briley said, “If you are looking to rely on this for 20 or more years, then there are some additional things that would be on that list.”
Circling back to the county’s declining rate structure, Briley said, “The structure is such that larger volume users are paying a lower unit cost. The current rates are for 5,000 gallons, a little over $57 on water monthly. Your current rates are a determining factor in grant eligibility because they want to make sure that water systems are charging appropriate rates, while making sure they are recovering their costs.”
Briley confirmed the figure of 5,000 gallons is hypothetical and does not accurately reflect Anson County’s water use or rate costs, adding that it is a number used to create a formula for graphing purposes, and the actutal number may be closer to 2,000 gallons.
Next, Briley unveiled a graph showing that, “If you increase the rates, you would move the county to a zone where the county would be more eligible for grants.”
When it comes to the waste water side of things, Hazen and Sawyer conducted “high-level assessment of that pump station, looking at the structural elements. One thing to note is that that pump station cannot handle the increased flow from Marshville, and there is an agreement in place to receive flow from Marshville in the future. It is fitting that it needs to be replaced and upsized. There is also a rate study going on on the wastewater side that dovetails nicely with the drinking water rate study.”
Briley confirms the project is expected to take a year to two years to fully complete and assures that the county’s water integrity will not be effected during the process.
