Water
Indy’s Water/Sewer Ownership Shift Proceeds Smoothly
It’s been more than six months since operation and ownership of water and sanitary sewer services in Indianapolis transferred from the city to a non-profit charitable trust, but most residential and commercial customers likely have experienced no difference in the day-to-day operation of these services.
Wichita gets grant for storm sewer project
EPA has awarded $123,000 to the city of Wichita, KS, for improvements to its storm sewer system. The project is expected to be completed by the fall of 2012.
U.S. Clean Water Act settlement in Chicago to reduce sewage overflows
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), the Department of Justice (DOJ), and the state of Illinois announced a Clean Water Act (CWA) settlement with the Metropolitan Water Reclamation District of Greater Chicago (MWRD) to resolve claims that untreated sewer discharges were released into Chicago area waterways during flood and wet weather events.
Fingers Crossed: 15th Annual Municipal Survey
After several years of the Great Recession, America’s underground infrastructure – already stretched thin before the economic crash – is rapidly approaching crisis levels, say city respondents to the 15th Annual Underground Construction Municipal Sewer & Water Survey. However, a majority of the survey participants believe that their city’s financial woes bottomed out in 2011 and anticipate the beginning of a slow turnaround late in 2012.
EPA awards grant to Missouri city for sewer project
EPA has awarded $1,455,000 to the city of Lee’s Summit, MO, for improvements to its sewer system. The project is expected to be completed by the summer of 2014.
Surviving An Exceptional Funding Drought
As last summer’s drought conditions wore on, I learned that there is a condition even worse than “extreme.” There is an “exceptional” drought category, which essentially means “pending devastation if you don’t get rain fast.” The impact of this drought, when finally broken, will be felt for years.
Rule Changes, Proposals Could Prove Significant For 2012 Underground Market
The One-Call and excavation damage provisions included in the new pipeline safety bill passed by Congress in December will trigger a number of state and federal responses in 2012. However, a rule allowing the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration (PHMSA) to impose civil penalties on excavators -- ordered by the 2006 pipeline safety bill but never finalized -- would be even more significant. A proposed rule moving that requirement forward is expected this year, finally, perhaps as early as this winter.
Birmingham Water Works tries to reassure customers
The Birmingham Water Works Board is distancing itself from Jefferson County’s financial woes following a filing on Nov. 9 of the largest government bankruptcy in U.S. history, according to an article in The Birmingham News.
Conference of Mayors touts local government efforts to spur broadband
The U.S. Conference of Mayors with other national associations has filed joint Reply Comments with the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), stating that local wireless citing and right-of-way management and compensation practices are not delaying broadband deployment.
Upgrade water system, create nearly 1.9 million jobs
Want to create nearly 1.9 million American jobs and add $265 billion to the economy? Upgrade our water and wastewater infrastructure. That’s the message of a new report released by Green For All, in partnership with American Rivers, the Economic Policy Institute and the Pacific Institute. The Rockefeller Foundation generously provided funding for the project.
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."
- Inside Sempra’s 72-mile pipeline with 18 major trenchless crossings
- PHMSA warns of heat risks in aging plastic gas distribution pipelines following deadly Pennsylvania explosion
- Trump vetoes bill to finish $1.3 billion Colorado water pipeline
- Infrastructure failure releases 100,000 gallons of wastewater in Houston; repairs ongoing
- OSHA seeks $1.2 million fine after fatal trench collapse in Connecticut