Perryville was in dire need of a new Wastewater Treatment Plant and they finally got one.
The city built and installed a brand new Oxidation Ditch Wastewater Treatment Plant.
Perryville Public Works Director Jeff Layton said the new and improved plant, which has been in use since July 22, is more advanced than the previous one.
The old facility was put into operations in 1976 with a flow capacity of 100,000 gallons per day. Since then, the plant had undergone three major upgrades in 1984, 1997 and 2006. The maximum capacity was 1.8 million gallon per day with the current daily flow average of 1 million gallons per day of influent wastewater.
“Our old plant was a trickling filter plant and it’s really old technology,” Layton said. “Most cities that have them are trying to replace them now and it doesn’t meet the current need. We were having trouble meeting the current limits of pollutants in the wastewater and would have had more trouble in the future. The Missouri Department of Natural Resources has changed its discharge limits for different metals and things found in wastewater treatment plants. When they tightened up these regulations the old plants were never built to handle that.”
This new one does however.
“It has the capabilities of meeting all those and then some,” Layton said. “It also has the capabilities of meeting limits on total Nitrogen and total Phosphorus, which is something that is coming. Long term studies are realizing that those pollutants are coming from effluent from plants in the future.”
The new facility is still located at the same location on Hidden Valley Lane and it still uses the same lab for sludge.
“That part was still fine for sludge handling,” Layton said. “We repurposed that and are still using it. As far as extracting the pollutants out of the wastewater, that is all done at the new facility.”
The new plant is rated for 2.5 MGD (millions of gallons per day) and a peak flow of 9 MGD.
“That’s when we get water from rain and things of that nature.” Layton said. “This is not only meeting our current needs, but for the possible growth of Perryville as well. We built the plant to be able to expand if we need to. We should be good for many, many years.”
The plant was funded through an SRF funded design build for $30 million. The funding gave the city approximately $27 million and Perryville paid for the rest through bonds.
In the month that the city has been running the new plant things have run smoothly.
“It’s excellent,” Layton said. “The effluent that is coming out is five times cleaner than before,” Layton said. “The air has barely any smell at all. Just the way the process works, it breaks things down quickly so there is barely any smell. It is a good enviromental process that has the capability to take anything we are throwing at it right now.”
The city will hold a ribbon cutting to introduce the new plant on Sept 21 at 12:15 p.m.
Layton is just excited to have the new plant up and ready. It does not produce as many headaches for him or the workers.
“Every time broke or went down on the old plant, we were trying not to spend as much money,” Layton said. “When you’re working with specialized equipment, it can be very expensive. We were working with contractors to come up with innovative ways to hobble along and kind of put duct tape on those problems so to speak. With this new plant, Perryville should be set up for a long time and it’s something everyone should be excited about.”
