Water
PVC Association launches Facebook contest to expose watermain break epidemic
Uni-Bell PVC Pipe Association is encouraging its more than 9,000 Facebook followers to shoot pictures of water main breaks or repairs in their local communities and submit them as contest entries to win an iPad.
Successful water treatment begins at Marcellus Shale
A Pennsylvania regulation became law in August that will help prevent the discharge of incompletely treated frac water from natural gas drilling into area rivers. Altela Inc., a water treatment company based in Albuquerque, NM, has begun implementation of the solution to the frac water problem at a plant in Williamsport by treating 100,000 gallons a day of frac water to better than drinking water standards.
Design Approach, Inspection For Manhole Rehabilitation Technologies
The design of manhole coating and lining systems must take into consideration a number of conditions in the manhole, both as a whole and as individual components. When evaluating the nature of the coating or lining that will work best, a number of conditions should be defined.
Houston Approved For Wastewater Systems Upgrades
The Texas Water Development Board (TWDB) has approved a $49.9 million loan from the Clean Water State Revolving Fund to the city of Houston (Harris County) to finance wastewater system improvements.
St. Louis To Pay $4.7B For Sewer Upgrades
The Metropolitan St. Louis Sewer District (MSD) signed a consent decree on Aug. 5 with regulators and environmentalists to make extensive improvements to its sewer systems and treatment plants, at an estimated cost of $4.7 billion over 23 years.
Record storm water proposals submitted to WERF
The Water Environment Research Foundation (WERF) received an unprecedented number of pre-proposals seeking funding for stormwater management research under its 2011 Unsolicited Research Program.
Atlanta gets A1 rating on water/wastewater bonds
Moody's Investors Service, one of the world’s leading credit rating agencies, affirmed in July Atlanta, GA’s A1 rating on the city’s $3.2 billion water and wastewater revenue bonds.
Jersey City to upgrade sewer system
The Jersey City, NJ, Municipal Utilities Authority (JCMUA) will spend more than $52 million on sewer repairs and upgrades and pay a civil penalty of $375,000 after repeated violations of the Clean Water Act, according to a settlement with the federal government.
County approves wastewater tunnel
On July 14, the Johnson County, KS, Board of Commissioners authorized construction of an underground effluent pipe between the treatment plant to a discharge point on the river.
Jefferson County seeks better deal to settle debt
In an effort to avoid filing the largest municipal bankruptcy in U.S. history, officials in Alabama’s Jefferson County extended until mid-September talks with creditors holding $3.14 billion in debt incurred after officials borrowed money to fix their troubled sewer system and then entered into a number of complicated and corruption-laced refinancing deals that backfired in 2007 with the mortgage lending crisis. Those schemes also resulted in the conviction of a number of local officials and businessmen.
Fighting City Hall
Extreme economic hardships for many municipalities are pushing some cities to consider extreme actions – such as the rarely occurring municipal bankruptcy. Consider the case of Birmingham/Jefferson County, AL.
Northeast Ohio regional sewer plan approved
In an effort to clean up Lake Erie that began with the passage of the Clean Water Act in 1972, U.S. District Court Judge Donald C. Nugent has approved a 25-year regional sewer district plan to reduce the amount of untreated waste that is dumped into local waterways, usually during flooding.
Public-private solutions proposed to repair decaying water infrastructure
In the keynote address to the 2011 Pennsylvania Infrastructure Summit, Pennsylvania American Water President Kathy L. Pape said recently that expecting government bailouts is not a realistic, long-term solution to fix aging water and wastewater systems, which require tens of billions of dollars of capital investment.
Hydrofracking changes water wells
A study by Duke University researchers has found high levels of leaked methane in well water collected near shale-gas drilling and hydrofracking sites.
Los Angeles Passes 1 Million Feet Of Trenchless Rehab
The city of Los Angeles, CA, recently completed 1 million feet of sewer that has been constructed or rehabilitated using trenchless technologies.
AWWA launches The Future of Water
The American Water Works Association (AWWA) announced the publication of <em>The Future of Water: A Startling Look Ahead</em>. The authors, Steve Maxwell with Scott Yates, take a serious look at how the world will soon value water, use water and access water.
Taking Water Pipe HDD To Extremes
Mesa Verde National Park is located in the relatively isolated southwestern corner of Colorado, near Durango. More than 1,000 years ago, the area was home to Pueblo-dwelling people, and the park contains more than 4,000 archeological sites -- including 600 cliff dwellings -- which are among the most notable and best preserved in the United States.
13th Annual Directional Drilling Survey: Mixed Market Recovery For HDD
While the overall market recovery for horizontal directional drilling appears to be improving at the mid-year point of 2011, many contractors are still struggling with sluggish economic conditions.
Tight Urban Directional Drilling
CenterPoint Energy Inc., Houston, TX, is a domestic energy delivery company that includes electric transmission and distribution, natural gas distribution, competitive natural gas sales and services, interstate pipelines and field services operations. It serves more than five million metered electric and natural gas customers in six states: Texas, Arkansas, Louisiana, Minnesota, Mississippi and Oklahoma.
Underground stormwater system is a win for retail development
As it often happens in urban areas where land is at a premium, the 4.5-acre site did not have enough space to fit in both a detention pond and parking lot. The engineers took the only possible option — designing an underground stormwater system. "If the engineers used an above-ground detention system, the site would have lost 22,000 sq. ft., which would have cost the owner about $166,000," said contractor Danny Clements at Danny Clements Builders. "Instead, an underground system is conveniently located under the parking lot, taking up no usable space."
Cities, counties getting funds for stormwater-control projects
The U.S. State Department of Ecology has announced the list of 43 cities and counties in the state of Washington that will get a share of $23.4 million to plan, design and build stormwater retrofit and low-impact development facility projects.
New guide helps municipalities monetize the value of green infrastructure
Quantifying the economic value of green infrastructure's benefits is the key to helping municipalities adopt this innovative and cost-effective stormwater management approach, according to a new report by the Center for Neighborhood Technology (CNT) and American Rivers.
Equipment Spotlight: Downhole Directional Drilling Tools
Downhole directional tools from Railhead, Sharewell, INROCK, Melfred Borzall, American Augers, Horizontal Technology, HammerHead, Vermeer, Ballantine and Ditch Witch.
Rapid Response Minimizes Pipe Failure at Encina Wastewater Treatment Plant
A sewage spill is a disaster that no city wants to experience, but as America’s wastewater infrastructure ages, these types of accidents will be occurring more frequently. The city of Carlsbad, CA, recently had the opportunity to test their preparedness for such a situation.
Baby Steps: 14th Annual Municipal Survey
After more than two years of declining revenues, tightening budgets and helplessly watching from the sidelines as their sewer and water infrastructure continues to decay and they are increasingly struggling to maintain current service levels, U.S. municipal personnel are hoping to experience at least a minor measure of improvement in 2011.
BC Hydro to upgrade Vancouver system
BC Hydro began construction in November 2010 on a $200-million transmission system for Vancouver’s central neighborhood, making its first significant investment in the city’s power grid in 30 years. The project includes boring a tunnel under False Creek and building a new substation in Mount Pleasant.
DeKalb reports major sewage spill
In Georgia’s DeKalb County, officials say 12,600 gallons of raw sewage spilled near Emory University on Jan. 16. A sewer pipe under Hancock Drive burst, spilling the untreated sewage into Peachtree Creek behind the college campus, according to DeKalb watershed management records.
Indianapolis plans to provide cleaner water
The Department of Justice, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the state of Indiana have reached an agreement with the city of Indianapolis on important modifications to a 2006 consent decree that will make Indianapolis’ sewer system more efficient, leading to major reductions in sewage contaminated water at a savings to the city of approximately $444 million.
Proposed HDD To Advance Water System On Hawaiian Islands
The Kauai Board of Water Supply has issued a Request for Proposals for a water development project that uses groundbreaking advances in the art of horizontal directional drilling (HDD), while building on existing water development technology in the Hawaiian Islands.
Dallas’ CIP Program Presented At UCTA
Charles Stringer, assistant director of Water Operations for the Dallas Water Utilities, Dallas, TX, did double duty when he delivered presentations at two chapter meetings for the Underground Construction Technology Association (UCTA). Attendees at the Gulf Coast Chapter meeting held in Houston on Oct. 12 and those who attended the new North Texas Chapter meeting in Euless, TX, on Oct. 14 had the opportunity to hear about the city of Dallas’ recommended 2010 Capital Improvement Plan.
- 290-mile gas pipeline expansion proposed across Georgia, Alabama and South Carolina
- $227 million Garnet Valley water project advances, set to create 73,000 jobs in Nevada
- Construction underway for $1.4 billion, 60-mile water pipeline in Chicago
- HDD industry faces challenges as cities push back on fiber drilling disruptions
- Worker dies after trench collapse at sewer project site in Norwich, Conn.
- Gehl and Mustang offer world’s largest skid loader
- Growing Pains and Gains
- Authorities investigating trench collapse that killed worker in Ashburn, Va.
- Pasadena, Calif., undergrounding project could take 500 years to finish
- $227 million Garnet Valley water project advances, set to create 73,000 jobs in Nevada