| Wastewater plant costs keep rising |
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By Joel Stottrup It is still not known when Princeton will get a permit from the state to expand its wastewater treatment plant (WWTP) at a cost of up to $20,158,000, but city council members are pressing to make it happen. The cost estimate for the expansion six years ago was $13,413,000. The figures then and now include the 20 percent cut for engineering, legal, administration and finance fees. That 20 percent in the $20 million plus estimate comes to $3,360,000. The council, with Mayor Jeremy Riddle absent, took up the project discussion during last Thursday’s council study session. The project was given a setback a few years ago by a lawsuit from the Minnesota Center for Environmental Advocacy (MCEA). The MCEA sued the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency (MPCA), charging that it did not follow proper procedure in issuing the permit for the city to expand the plant. The MCEA said the MPCA did not require the city to exhaust all steps to see if it could use alternative means to reduce the amount of plant expansion proposed. The plans for the expansion includes discharging the treated wastewater into the Rum River that runs not far from the WWTP. Right now the treated wastewater goes into holding ponds, or lagoons adjacent to the plant. But the state says they are not good enough, stating that the separation between the bottom of the ponds and the groundwater is too narrow. Treated wastewater in those ponds seeps into the ground. The state appealed the district court’s ruling in favor of the MCEA and the state lost the appeal. But the city with the state’s help, has been trying to negotiate an agreement with the MCEA since the court case to see what kind of wastewater plant expansion that would satisfy the environmental group. Phosphorous and filtration issues One of the purposes of a wastewater treatment plant is to filter out phosphorous, mercury and other hazardous substances. Phosphorous increases plant growth in bodies of water including Lake Pepin, where the Mississippi River widens along the southeastern side of the state. The worry is that much phosphorous will lead to the demise of the lake as well as promote unwanted plant growth in other water bodies and streams. Princeton City Administrator Mark Karnowski, at last Thursday’s council session, said that engineers have talked about the possibility of having to add two sand filters to the plant expansion at a cost of $1 million per filter. Tracy Ekola, with SEH, the engineering firm the city is consulting with for the proposed WWTP expansion, was at the council meeting and said she doesn’t yet know if the sand filters would be required. Doubling or tripling? Ekola told the council it will have to show that the city can justify the need for tripling the capacity of its WWTP, versus doubling. One of the factors that would be looked at is the slowdown in housing construction and the amount of population increase in Princeton, Ekola said. Ekola noted that the city’s most recent proposal to expand the plant has been sent to the MPCA and the city is awaiting the MPCA’s response. Ekola noted that the judge in the court case over issuing the permit, stated that the city could negotiate a phosphorous trade with someone. What it means is the city would arrange to acquire credits toward phosphorous reduction from some other location that has been able to keep its phosphorous discharge amounts lower than its maximum allowed phosphorous discharge. The place the city has looked at for trading the phosphorous units is the Metro Council for Environmental Services. Some options for the city to look at, Ekola continued, are to reduce phosphorous and nutrient-rich discharges from the area into the river. Buffer strips could be made between the river and where drain tile pipes come out, Ekola suggested. Council member Victoria Hallin asked if government grants exist for creating the buffering. Ekola answered that the city could perhaps get assistance through its county soil and water conservation service, in which 70 percent would be federal money and the rest would be matched locally. Hallin said she liked the idea that the city would try to reduce phosphorous discharge into the city more than just to acquire phosphorous reduction credits and “look the other way” as local phosphorous goes into the river. Karnowski responded that the amount of phosphorous discharge from a wastewater plant is so much less than the non-point discharge sites like farm land and cattle standing near a river. Money, money, money The cost of expanding the plant, and whether tripling the size is necessary, brought some debate. Council member Lee Steinbrecher suggested that the city not assume that it has to triple the size of its wastewater plant, that perhaps doubling would be fine for the next 20 years. Steinbrecher pointed out that the city’s tax base and population have not increased so much in the past six years yet the estimated cost of the expansion has risen by almost $7 million. “Fairly soon we need to talk demographics,” Steinbrecher said at the council session. Steinbrecher suggested looking ahead very carefully to project if there is enough reason to triple the plant capacity and that the discussion begin soon before it is time to design the project. When the cost of expansion was once $12 million, that was a lot, Steinbrecher said. Now with the city’s population not increasing so much and the project estimate is now close to $20 million, “the red flags get larger,” he added. Karnowski suggested considering economics of scale. Doubling the plant will have a certain cost but then for a fraction more, it could be tripled, he explained. It would be too bad if the plant was doubled and then five years later it was discovered more expansion is needed and a costly new project would have to begin, he said. Distilled liquor mixing plant Another part of the discussion was about the United States Distilled Products (USDP) plant in Princeton’s main industrial park. The plant mixes and bottles liquors. One of the off sides of the USDP operation is the production of wastewater that has some alcohol content but also a high amount of sugar. It is especially the sugar that requires a wastewater treatment plant to work extra hard and use much more of its treatment capacity, Karnowski explained. Nearly a decade ago the council and USDP officials argued over whether the city should have to take USDP’s plant wastewater. The outcome of the debate was an agreement in which the city agreed to take the wastewater from the part of the USDP plant that was not high in sugar or alcohol. USDP has been hauling the high-sugar wastewater out of town for processing. Now Princeton city officials and USDP have been discussing the idea of a pre-treatment plant. It would remove most of the high sugar content, leaving wastewater that would not tax the capacity of the city wastewater plant so much. The council did reach a consensus to ask consulting engineering firms if they would consider doing some free engineering estimates regarding the possible construction of a pretreatment plant. Princeton Public Works Superintendent Tom Mismash, who oversees the operation of the city wastewater plant, suggested that if a wastewater pretreatment plant was located next to the USDP plant, it could attract industry that also has “high strength stuff that it wants to get rid of.” Possible construction timetable Although the city may be further ahead now in its intent to expand its wastewater plant, some major issues are unresolved as evidenced by last Thursday’s council study discussion. Council members provided a possible timetable for the WWTP expansion project if the state reissued a permit at the earliest possible time. It calls for completing an application to apply for a low interest loan next month from the government for the project. Then the design would tentatively begin in October and be done in July 2009. The state would review everything as early as October 2009, and the project would be bid the following month. Construction could then be completed in either 2011 or 2012. Karnowski, in an interview, noted that besides sewer rate fees helping pay for costs of expanding a plant, the city charges developers fees for new developments to cover future wastewater processing costs due to the development. Comments (0)
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Princeton Union Eagle
P.O. Box 278
Princeton, MN 55371
Telephone: 763-389-1222
Fax: 763-389-1728
