The Tooele Waste Water Treatment Facility was officially rechristened the Water Reclamation Facility Monday during a ribbon cutting ceremony and open house.
The official ceremony began at 9 a.m. with several speeches from prominent city officials and members of the facility’s project team.
Jim Bolser, community development and public works director, said that Monday’s ceremony represented the completion of a significant upgrade to the facility.
“This facility now operates as a complete water and solids reclamation system unlike any other in the country,” he said. “Of the 2 to 2.5 million gallons of effluent that enters this facility every day, on average only about 29 gallons cannot be reused. That represents one ten thousandth of one percent of every drop that comes into this facility.”
Since its opening in 2000 the city has invested $4.5 million into the project. With the newest upgrades, the facility has eliminated the need for chemicals to treat the water and now relies on natural means to filter waste from the water for reuse.
Following the ribbon cutting ceremony the public was invited to tour the facility until 1 p.m. to observe the new upgrades and how the facility operates.
Some of the new upgrades include an ultraviolet disinfecting system, which replaced the chemical disinfectant, a solar drying greenhouse to process the solid waste into a reusable product, and a new oxidation tank that helps shorten the time it takes to treat the water.
Dan Olson, water reclamation specialist, said the facility is the first of its kind in the U.S. and that designation wouldn’t be possible without his staff and a supportive city council.
“This has been quite a project coming around,” he said. “It was a big undertaking and it has taken a huge amount of coordination to pull this together. We had a wonderful team and I don’t think we could have had a better team to make this possible.”
Huber Technologies built and supplied many of the new upgrades to the facility, including the new solar waste drying greenhouse that turns biosolids waste into a Class A reusable product.
Frank Scriver, Huber Technologies representative, thanked the Tooele City for its investment in protecting and cultivating environmental consciousness during his portion of the ceremony.
“Energy efficiency, environmental awareness, these aren’t just words at Huber Technologies,” he said. “They are what drives our innovation. From solar drying technology to heating recovery from waste water, these are all innovations that we like to bring to our customers and the industry. We really want to recognize cities like Tooele and their focus on the future. Congratulations and we look forward to many years of solar drying in [the city’s] future.”
A Class A reusable product is something that can be placed onto gardens by homeowners and sold to the general public. Before the upgrade the facility was only producing a Class B reusable product, which limited it to commercial farms.
The facility has gone through two major upgrades during its 13 years of operation.
Mayor Patrick Dunlavy said during the ribbon cutting that the city is extremely proud of its facility.
“The upgrade doubled the capacity of waste water that can be processed by the facility and gave us the option to handle solid waste,” he said, “You need to understand that a lot of study went into this facility. When you do something for the first time, and you become the poster child, you have some apprehension.
“But I can tell you it took some courage to go through with this facility,” he added. “It is time to step up and have the courage to try it and we couldn’t be happier.”