The sewer system that serves the city was started in
1976. With the establishment of the
system a number of components were constructed.
The system includes a wastewater plant which is primarily a series of
ponds, a pumping facility including pipeworks, and an irrigation system that
discharges treated wastewater. To get the
wastewater to the treatment plant the city employs a number of lift
stations.
Lift stations essentially pump wastewater from a lower area
to a higher area in the system. A lift
station involves a wet well that accumulates wastewater and generally two pumps
that alternate pumping. The pumped water
goes to the higher sewer allowing gravity to move the flow in the system. The pumps operate with the help of a control
panel that houses electric equipment.
This equipment keeps track of pumping time, alternates the pumps and
addresses concerns with downtime through an alarm system. The alarm system is hooked up to a phone line
with an automated dialer that calls public works staff in the event of a
problem.
As you can imagine these electronic systems become outdated
and wear out. They do receive periodic
updates and repairs. Sooner or later
however the system needs to be replaced.
In addition the housing for this equipment also starts to fail making
the components vulnerable to weather. You can only apply so much caulk to try and keep
the cabinets watertight. Lift station
number one controls the flow of all the wastewater in the city sending it
through a forcemain to the wastewater treatment plant. As such it gets more use than any other lift
station in the system. This lift station
control panel was budgeted to be replaced this year.
The city received quotes from two vendors for the
replacement. The high quote was received
at $34,346. The lower quote was from
Quality Control & Integration at $22,890.
The city council approved the award of the replacement to Quality
Control and Integration at their August meeting. We had budgeted $40,000 for this effort.
We anticipated that the replacement would be accomplished in
late September or early October but as luck would have it, it was accomplished
last week. The process took about a day
swapping out the old equipment to the new equipment. The process involved cutting power to the
lift station and removing the old control panel. With the use of the city generator, power was
given to the old control panel while it operated one of the pumps. The other pump was hooked up to the new
control panel. Once that was operational
the old panel was discontinued and the new panel was placed into service with
the second pump being connected and brought on line. Electrical service was returned and the new
panel was made operational. The system
was tested and all systems were a go.
The next project for this system is to install a by-pass
structure at this lift station to provide for emergency service in the event we
have a failure. Currently there is no
means to pump externally to the forcemain that feeds the wastewater plant. We hope to accomplish this yet this
fall.
