Managers of the Snyderville Water Reclamation District are hard at work in the midst of their multi-million-dollar revamp of the Silver Creek Treatment Plant.
District Director Mike Luers and the project manager, Mike Boyle, said they are not only rebuilding the Silver Creek plant, located near the junction of I-80 and Highway 40, but have been expanding it.
Luers said they undertook a similar process in the early 2000’s with its counterpart—the Jeremy Ranch Treatment Plant.
“The purpose for that advanced treatment is to protect the downstream creeks and reservoirs,” Luers explained. “Well the same thing needed to be done on the other side of our community on the Silver Creek and Echo Reservoir area took this treatment plant that was built in 1985. We tore it down; we built the new one and we're providing advanced treatment. It’s called tertiary treatment and at the same time we expanded it to accommodate the new growth in our community.”
He said the upgrade cost some $51 million, and the design work started back in late 2014. The planning required up to 50 engineers. Luers said of the overall cost, 93% is paid for by new growth—that is, impact fees—and 7% from existing users.
Luers said the project has been on time and on budget.
“Just the other day we turned the old facility off and turned the new one on and everything is working beautifully,” Luers continued. “We were very very happy; again, we have a lot of work to do yet in the way of tearing down the old facility and putting the roads in and all those kind of things.”
Luers explained just what the upgrade is doing.
“When we talk about advanced treatment what we're really talking about is removing nutrients, nitrogen, phosphorus, to very low levels to protect our pristine mountain streams,” Luers said. “In Silver Creek just like East Canyon Creek very low flows during the summertime in particular. In order to protect the stream and the downstream reservoir, in this case Echo Reservoir and ultimately the Weber River, these nutrient levels need to be very very low.”
Mike Boyle said the switchover at Silver Creek occurred on April 3rd.
“Within two days we were meeting well within our permit limits,” Boyle explained. “We’re very pleased. It's on now 24/7 it's working and we're in the process now of demolishing the existing plant that's already begun. Then throughout the summer and fall we will be putting in landscaping and paving and taking care of what's called punch list items. The last few things that need to be addressed.”
Boyle said it has been a challenge to make the switch and still maintain their operations.
“The construction challenge was to build this new facility in and amongst the existing processes,” Boyle continued. “That required a lot of planning as Mike mentioned and a lot of sleepless nights in making sure that we weren't interfering with the existing process while we put in the new one.”
Luers said that the district is seeing so much growth, that by next year, it will have to start looking again at another upgrade for Jeremy Ranch.
“We have space there,” Luers said. “We've planned to do this all within our current footprints but again it's a project that will be needed to meet the future growth.”
Boyle added that he is due to retire in June after 28 years with the district.
