By BOB SHRALUKA
WZBD.com
The city of Decatur is replacing failing aeration lines in tanks at the Decatur Wastewater Treatment plant at a cost of $63,271, but the efforts of city employees kept the expense from being much higher.
A group of them recently spent two weeks helping with cleaning three aeration tanks containing 600,000 gallons of mixed liquor (micro-organisms), along with removing old equipment. (See photo)
The work prepared the area for replacing the lines.
“I would say they saved us 30, 40 thousand (by not having to hire a company to do the job),” Mayor Dan Rickord told the board of works at safety at its latest meeting. “I’m not really sure (of the savings), but I know it was a ton of money.”
Wastewater Superintendent Karey Fuelling had told the board at a previous meeting that the aeration pods at the Monmouth Road plant were no longer working. The aeration lines were 14 years old with very little maintenance, she said, recommending that they all be replaced.
There are three main lines and 1,008 pods.
The cleaning was described as “labor intensive” and was done by the following city workers: Bob Gavin, Nick Winters, Luke Harvey, Josh Butler, Brice Gavin, Andrea Ortiz, Tom Barker, and Josh Zimmerman, the city’s infrastructure manager.
Fuelling informed the board at its latest meeting that she has ordered the equipment to complete the project of replacing the aeration lines.
Another savings of around $14,000 was realized by ordering equipment for all three tanks at once, rather than individually.
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