Municipal Water Leader November/December 2015

November/December 2015 Volume 1 Issue 4

Leading the Stewardship of Denver’s Water Resources: An Interview With Jim Lochhead

Leading the Stewardship of Water

By Kris Polly Our interview with Mr. Jim Lochhead, chief executive officer and manager of Denver Water, is appropriately titled, “Leading the Stewardship of Denver’s Water Resources,” and sets a perfect theme for this issue of Municipal Water Leader magazine. Jim and the 1,100 employees of Denver Water are doing extraordinary things to provide and safeguard their water supply that the majority of the public is unaware.

Blessed with a largely gravity flow system, Denver Water produces more energy than it consumes from its numerous hydroelectric power plants and passes the savings on to the ratepayers. With its 4,000-square-mile watershed, Denver Water has a large footprint and is very active in forest management. Denver Water’s priorities of long-term planning, efficiency, and customer service are evident in their high customer satisfaction numbers.

Colorado Springs Utilities’ Southern Delivery System is another great example of stewardship. Our article discusses the results of solid planning, local collaboration, and the importance of using the right materials, namely, a water transmission pipe system that is corrosion protected and engineered to last 100 years.

Congressman Bill Shuster (R-PA), chairman of the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, continues the theme of water stewardship and planning for the future by informing our readers about his committee’s efforts on the upcoming Water Resources Development Act legislation. A firm believer in the importance of infrastructure, Chairman Shuster has made the Water Resources Development Act a top priority for his committee.

Mr. Eric Wilkinson, general manager of the Northern Colorado Water Conservancy District has a tremendous mind for details. I recently heard him give an off-the-cuff introduction of former Senator Hank Brown (R-CO) at the annual conference of the National Water Resources

Association, and I was so impressed by his documentaryquality description of Senator Brown’s full career and multiple achievements. Eric’s interview for this magazine is another example of his abilities. I especially enjoyed his history on the 13.1‑mile‑long Alva B. Adams tunnel that was bored in the 1940s.

Mr. Scott Potter, president of the Association of Metropolitan Water Agencies, is an exceptionally educated and experienced individual and a recognized leader in the treated water community. He provides an excellent description of the association and its mission.

Mr. Dick Doyle, president and chief executive officer of the Vinyl Institute discusses the advantages of noncorrosive pipe materials and the cost savings that may be realized by water agencies.

Finally, Mr. Bo Bonn and Mr. Bill Christopherson discuss their efforts to help a small town in Nebraska to comply with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s arsenic rule. By modifying an existing well to only access high-quality water, their technology offers a much-needed low-cost alternative to treatment. Such technology has national implication and will allow small towns and other municipalities to make better use of their limited budgets.

We hope you enjoy reading this issue of Municipal Water Leader magazine and learning about some impressive people who are leading the stewardship of water.

Kris Polly is editor-in-chief of Municipal Water Leader and Irrigation Leader magazines. He is also president of Water Strategies LLC, a government relations, marketing, and publishing company he began in February 2009 for the purpose of representing and guiding water, power, and agricultural entities in their dealings with Congress, the Bureau of Reclamation, and other federal government agencies. He may be contacted at Kris.Polly@waterstrategies.com.

Are you Advertising in Municipal Water Leader?

Join a growing group of public– and private–sector water resources leaders. If you have a product or service that would be beneficial to municipal water suppliers and treatment providers, we invite you to advertise in Municipal Water Leader magazine.

The magazine is published 10 times a year and includes a collection of articles from top municipal water entities, as well as editorials from policymakers across the country.

Municipal Water Leader is sent to approximately 12,000 organizations, including every municipal water provider and treatment facility with an annual budget or sales of $10 million or more, all 535 members of Congress, all 50 governors, all 7,382 state legislators, key federal and state agencies, 259 water-related trade associations, and a variety of top construction and engineering firms throughout the country.

For more information, please contact Kris Polly at

(703) 517-3962 or Kris.Polly@waterstrategies.com

NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2015

C O N T E N T S 2 Leading the Stewardship of Water

Volume 1 Issue 4 Municipal Water Leader is published 10 times a year with combined issues for July/August and November/December by Water Strategies LLC 4 E Street SE Washington, DC 20003 STAFF: Kris Polly, Editor-in-Chief John Crotty, Editor Valentina Valenta, Writer Robin Pursley, Graphic Designer Capital Copyediting LLC, Copyeditor SUBMISSIONS: Municipal Water Leader welcomes manuscript, photography, and art submissions. However, the right to edit or deny publishing submissions is reserved.

Submissions are returned only on request.

ADVERTISING: Municipal Water Leader accepts one-quarter, half-page, and full-page ads. For more information on rates and placement, please contact Kris Polly at (703) 517-3962 or Municipal.Water.Leader@waterstrategies.com.

CIRCULATION: Municipal Water Leader is distributed nationally to managers and boards of directors of water agencies with annual budgets of $10 million or more; the governors and state legislators in all 50 states; all members of Congress and select committee staff; and advertising sponsors. For address corrections or additions, please contact our office at Municipal.Water.Leader@waterstrategies.com.

Copyright 2015 Water Strategies LLC. Municipal Water Leader relies on the excellent contributions of a variety of natural resources and water industry professionals who provide content for the magazine. However, the views and opinions expressed by these contributors are solely those of the original contributor and do not necessarily represent or reflect the policies or positions of Municipal Water Leader, its editors, or Water Strategies LLC. The acceptance and use of advertisements in Municipal Water Leader do not constitute a representation or warranty by Water Strategies LLC or Municipal Water Leader magazine regarding the products, services, claims, or companies advertised.

COVER PHOTO: Jim Lochhead, General Manager of Denver Water.

(Photo provided by Denver Water) Municipal Water Leader

By Kris Polly

4 Leading the Stewardship of Denver’s

Water Resources: An Interview With Jim Lochhead

12 Lean Program Transforming Denver Water

14 Colorado’s Southern Delivery

System: Transporting Water for the Future

Legislative Profile 18 Building on Success

By Congressman Bill Shuster

Manager Profile 22 Eric Wilkinson, Northern Colorado Water Conservancy District Association Profile 28 Scott Potter, President of the Association of Metropolitan Water Agencies Business Leaders 32 PVC Pipe for Performance and Value to Water Utilities The Innovators 36 Water Quality Isolation in Wauneta, Nebraska CLASSIFIED LISTINGS 39 Classifieds 3

Leading the Stewardship of Denver’s Water Resources:

An Interview With Jim Lochhead

Jim Lochhead was appointed Denver Water’s chief executive officer and manager in 2010. He serves on the boards of the Association of Metropolitan Water Agencies, the Water Research Foundation, the Western Urban Water Coalition, the Water Utility Climate Alliance, the Denver Metro Chamber of Commerce, and the Metro Denver Economic Development Council. Prior to his appointment at Denver Water, Mr. Lochhead was in private law practice, dealing with natural resource issues throughout the United States and internationally.

He was also executive director of the Colorado Department of Natural Resources. Mr. Lochhead was the Colorado governor’s representative on interstate Colorado River operations.

In 2014, the Colorado Water Congress awarded Mr. Lochhead the Wayne N. Aspinall Water Leader of the Year award, an honor presented annually to a Coloradan who has demonstrated courage, dedication, knowledge, and leadership in the development, protection, and preservation of Colorado water.

In 2015, Mr. Lochhead received the President’s Award from the Colorado Foundation for Water Education, which is given to a person with an outstanding history of doing meaningful work in the field of water.

Mr. Lochhead has a bachelor’s degree in environmental biology from the University of Colorado and a law degree from the University of Colorado School of Law. Municipal Water Leader’s editor-in-chief, Kris Polly, spoke with Mr. Lochhead about managing Colorado’s oldest and largest water utility, the utility’s commitment to environmental stewardship, and new plans and innovations to maintain a sustainable supply for a growing population.

Kris Polly: Please describe Denver Water’s operations and service area for our readers.

Jim Lochhead: Denver Water was established in 1918 under Denver’s city charter as a nonpolitical entity that is

a separate enterprise from the city. I report to a five-member board appointed by the mayor. We independently finance projects, select our own employees, and operate with a longterm view. That framework has proven to be a great advantage to our customers, because we have the ability to plan, finance, build, and maintain necessary water infrastructure investments for our customers without being obligated to short-term political interests.

We serve about 1.3 million people in the Denver metropolitan area, or roughly 25 percent of the state’s population. Half our customers reside in the city of Denver, and the other half reside in the suburbs. Though we use less than 2 percent of the water in Colorado, we have a fairly large footprint across the state. Our total watershed area is about 4,000 square miles, encompassing national forest land, private land, and our own land. In fact, we are the third-largest landowner in the state. We operate facilities in more than 10 counties across Colorado. We have nearly 1,100 employees who manage our system’s dams, reservoirs, treatment plants, and distribution systems, as well as administrative functions, customer service programs, and conservation projects. Our workforce is a dedicated and impressive group.

Kris Polly: How does water from west of the Continental Divide figure into Denver’s water supply?

Jim Lochhead: Our water supply comes purely from snowpack, so it is really good water. That also means our supply is somewhat variable. We get about half our water supply from the Colorado River basin, west of the Continental Divide, and the other half from the South Platte River basin, east of the divide. Since 80 percent of the state’s population is located east of the divide and 80 percent of our water supply is located west of the divide, the subject of water supply and diversions of water across the Continental Divide has been a

Cheesman Dam and Reservoir in Sedalia, Colorado.

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source of political and legal wrangling between western and eastern Colorado for decades.

It is important to note that we residents of the Colorado River basin are dependent on a source that supplies seven states and the country of Mexico, nearly 40 million people, and that generates a total municipal economic output among all the major water utilities of $1.7 trillion—equal to the world’s 12th largest economy. That total is in addition to the 5.5 million acres of irrigated agriculture and a vitally important recreational economy. And, of course, the river is an environmental resource that must be sustained. It is a hardworking river.

Denver Water, along with other municipal utilities, the states, the federal government, and Mexico, is engaged in dealing with this resource. That is particularly important right now, because the river is in the midst of a drought that is unprecedented in the last 1,200 years.

Needless to say, Denver Water has a great stake in the security of its water supply from the Colorado River. It is essential for us to be able to continue serving our customers in the decades to come.

Kris Polly: How does Denver Water integrate the environment into accomplishing its mission to deliver a clean freshwater supply to its customers?

Jim Lochhead: As a major water provider in the West, we have a special responsibility to the environment, and we take that role very seriously. Our mission statement speaks to the organization as being a responsible steward of the resources, assets, and natural environment that is entrusted to us. I think the word stewardship really speaks to our history of longrange planning, to the need for us to protect the health of our water supplies into the future, and to our preparation for any contingency. We can’t deliver clean water to our customers unless the ecosystem supplying that water is also healthy. So, we view our system as not just dams, reservoirs, and treatment plants, but as a component of the natural environment and the watersheds that supply our water.

We have done a number of things to enhance the environment and the health of the water supply for our customers. For example, we entered into an agreement with 40 different entities in western Colorado to implement programs that will enhance the aquatic environment of watersheds in the Colorado River basin. Through that agreement, we committed to provide $25 million toward those programs as well as water from our system for stream health.

We have seven clean energy hydropower facilities in our system with the capacity to generate a total of 25 megawatts of power. The amount of energy our facilities actually produce each year varies because it is dependent on the weather and customer water use. For example, in 2014, Denver Water generated 60 million kilowatt-hours. The electricity we sell to the power utility offsets our energy bill. In 2014, we passed Municipal Water Leader

Water quality testing at Denver Water’s Foothills Treatment Plant.

$4.4 million in energy savings—two-thirds of our total power bill—along to our ratepayers. Overall, because our system is largely gravity fed, we produce more energy than we consume at our pumping and water treatment facilities.

We maintain an extensive watershed program, including a landmark program in partnership with the U.S. Forest Service called From Forests to Faucets. This partnership allows us to work in high-priority watersheds to accelerate forest health treatments that promote healthier, more resilient forests, reduce wildfire risks, restore burned areas, and lessen erosion into reservoirs.

We are also active in the endangered species recovery programs in the Colorado and Platte River basins. These programs seek to provide security to water users under the Endangered Species Act through measures designed to recover species populations to the point that they can be delisted.

Finally, Denver Water’s water conservation programs are recognized worldwide as forward-thinking models. We reduced our total water use by more than 20 percent in the last 10 years despite a more than 10 percent increase in population. Conservation and protection of the environment are engrained in all of our operations.

Kris Polly: Denver Water’s Integrated Resource Plan (IRP) is intended to chart the path to a future of high-quality water supply. Please share with our readers a description and the current status of the IRP. 5

Jim Lochhead: We were one of the first utilities in the country to recognize scenario planning as the foundation of long-term capital and water supply planning. The traditional water planning approach assumes that the future will look like the past and that we can simply do a linear projection to determine our needs.

Under scenario planning, we must view the future as a series of varying deviations from the past. In this way, we are prepared for a wider array of possible outcomes and drivers of our needs.

If we are going to maintain responsibility to our customers, we must be prepared for anything. So, in the development of our IRP, we used scenario planning to construct different possible futures that incorporated a number of variables, such as a warming climate, different economic conditions, different growth patterns within our service area, and even different social norms regarding water use efficiency. The idea is that we should make decisions designed to meet any of those possible future scenarios.

The IRP has evolved since 1995, and we are about to engage in the next version. Our past IRPs were focused primarily on future water supply needs. This next version will inform our need to develop new and different sources of water and our long-term capital plan, including the size and configuration of our treatment plants, treated water storage, and distribution networks.

These components are all affected by different conditions.

For example, demand and growth patterns are going to directly affect infrastructure decisions across our entire service area.

decisionmakers about helping water utilities weather the burdens of drought?

Kris Polly: Let’s consider drought conditions from a policy perspective. What is your advice to our federal

Kris Polly: What types of improvements in forest health are needed?

Jim Lochhead: Congress is currently considering legislation that would deal with the drought in California, but there are some ideas that ought to be added to the debate that would deal with drought more broadly in the West. For example, we might consider whether to incorporate greater flexibility into the operation of federal reservoirs, either under the jurisdiction of the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation or the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, to be able to more easily and efficiently manage drought and move water across various sectors.

As we continue to deal with drought and climate change, we need to be a lot more nimble in terms of our ability to construct and develop new infrastructure. That means federal and state permitting processes must be made more efficient and streamlined. The rigor with which environmental permitting processes protect the environment should not be relaxed, but the length of time it takes to get through the permitting process must be reduced. For example, Denver Water has been involved for over 13 years in a permitting process to enlarge an existing dam in our system. It simply shouldn’t take that long.

Finally, we need to deal with watershed health. Currently, the federal government is borrowing money from watershed health and sustainment programs and using it to respond to wildfires.

Obviously, we need to respond to wildfires on federal land, but if we don’t spend money on watershed and forest health, then we are just going to keep getting further and further behind the curve. As we experience extended periods of drought and climate change, we must make investments in forest health in order to mitigate the catastrophic effects of wildfires on our federal lands.

Pumps at Denver Water’s Recycling Plant treat and send water for irrigation and industrial purposes throughout the Denver Water service area.

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Municipal Water Leader

We are also planning to spend about $1.5 billion over the next 10 years on our long‑term capital plan, which includes rebuilding the north end of our system, enlarging a reservoir, installing new conduits, and constructing a brand new treatment plant.

As an enterprise, our governance model allows us to undertake these types of long-term plans to sustainably manage our system. It helps that Denver Water is 1 of only 10 water utilities in the country that is rated AAA+ by all three bond rating agencies.

Kris Polly: Is Denver Water engaged in water recycling at this time?

Lochhead addressing employees at a Denver Water function in February 2013.

Jim Lochhead: In Colorado, we have a huge problem concerning the buildup of fuel in our forests. We had a couple of catastrophic wildfires in Denver Water’s watersheds that caused vast amounts of sediment to be deposited in one of our reservoirs. That creates water quality and dam safety problems that will last for decades. We have had other fires on the Front Range in the last few years that have adversely affected other municipal water utilities. We need to remember that the national forests were created under the Organic Act [Forest Service Organic Administration Act of 1897] for the purpose of watershed health and water supply, and they need to be managed as such.

Kris Polly: How does the repair and replacement of aging infrastructure figure into operations at Denver Water?

Jim Lochhead: We have over 3,000 miles of pipe in our system, 19 reservoirs, 22 pump stations, and 4 treatment plants. Given the large number of components in our system, rehabilitation and replacement of that infrastructure is an ongoing effort. We have made a lot of progress managing our system. We use specific metrics and measure the status of our assets to prioritize infrastructure investments. We study the possibilities of infrastructure failing and use metrics on the condition of our system to determine when to replace lines.

We also have metrics on the total number of hours per year that our customers are out of water due to unplanned outages. If the total number of hours of unplanned outages is decreasing, then we know we are doing a lot of things right.

We are maintaining our system better, increasing our response to main breaks, and getting our customers back into service more quickly. Over the last few years, we’ve cut the total number of hours of unplanned outages in half.

Municipal Water Leader

Jim Lochhead: We have an active water recycling plant at which we take water directly from the Denver Metro Water Wastewater Treatment Plant and treat it to irrigation standards for use in a number of parks, golf courses, and industries. We also reuse water by exchange, trading some of our reusable water supplies with other water users in order to store water higher in our system.

Our goal is to be able to reuse all our reusable supplies.

To achieve greater efficiency of overall water use in our system, we will eventually need to capture rainwater, manage storm water, and use greywater and blackwater for nonpotable purposes in buildings and for irrigation. This is a one water approach. In the future, we ought to be using potable water only for potable purposes.

Kris Polly: What are the biggest challenges Denver Water faces today, and what do you foresee as the biggest problems over the next two or three decades?

Jim Lochhead: I believe we have four major challenges ahead of us. The first is climate change. We know the earth is getting warmer, and although we don’t totally understand why, we still need to deal with it. For example, we know that Colorado’s snowpack is melting an average of 2 weeks earlier than it did only 10 years ago. Whether climate change will mean more or less precipitation for Colorado is an open question. But we know the precipitation will take different forms between rain and snow, and we have climate scientists on our staff to help us prepare for the future. Our IRP will incorporate climate change scenarios into our infrastructure planning.

The second challenge is the Colorado River. As I mentioned, we get half our water supply from the Colorado River. The river as a whole has been in a severe drought since 2002. Under the Colorado River Compact, the upper basin states (Colorado, New Mexico, Utah, and Wyoming), through a collective obligation, must be sure that enough water goes to the lower basin states (Arizona, California, and Nevada). Denver Water is always at risk of losing half our water supply. We are proactively engaged in discussions 7

about how to develop an emergency response plan on the Colorado River to prevent that from happening.

Our third challenge is growth. We know the population within our service area is going to grow a lot in the coming decades. Colorado’s population is going to double by 2050.

How we handle that growth will affect service to our customers. We are collaborating with water providers on the Front Range to deal with the challenges that surrounding communities will face.

Finally, we have an imbalanced system. Through our IRP, we will develop a strategy for efficiency, diversity, redundancy, and investment in the right projects, at the right time, and at the right size. In this way, we can be as prepared as possible for an uncertain future.

Kris Polly: What are Denver Water’s biggest accomplishments?

Jim Lochhead: Like any utility, we have had many accomplishments, and also setbacks, over the years. The history of a water utility truly reflects the history of the region. The fact that Denver is an exciting and vibrant city is in part due to the successes of Denver Water.

I am really proud of the progress we’ve made over the last several years in the areas of collaboration and innovation.

For example, we entered into an agreement with western Colorado to enhance conservation programs and protect watersheds in western Colorado, which has generated support to enlarge one of the reservoirs in our system.

We also partner with the business community to develop messaging strategies about the value that we bring to the economic development of the Denver metro area. We are an active member of the Denver Metro Chamber of Commerce. The City of Denver wouldn’t exist but for our water utility. We have great relationships with state and local policymakers. All of these groups understand the benefit of our planning and infrastructure investment.

We made huge strides in water conservation and efficiency. Through a program with worldwide recognition, we reduced our water use by over 20 percent in the last decade while the population of our service area increased by 10 percent. We are focused on the next wave of innovation in efficiency, working across the agriculture and stormwater management sectors to implement a one water strategy.

We made a number of strides in infrastructure investment and replacement. By using metrics and asset and risk management principles, we ensure that we are rehabilitating and building the right projects at the right time for the right reasons.

Finally, over the last several years, we have placed a focus on efficiency and customer service. In 2011, we implemented the lean program in our systems. Lean is an efficiency program developed by Toyota to eliminate waste and redundancy in the manufacturing process. The program has 8

Denver Water Assistant Water Treatment Plant Supervisor Andrea Song at Denver Water's Moffat Treatment Plant.

been adopted by hospitals, the military, and many businesses in the United States. We are one of the first water utilities in the world to implement the program.

Our customers have realized enormous savings through the program. We have improved the efficiency of our customer service delivery, cutting the time of processing rebates and replacing water mains. Across the board, we are a lot more responsive and efficient in the eyes of our customers. The bottom line is customer satisfaction. The number of customers who are highly satisfied with our service has gone up 8 percent in the last two years, from 63 to 71 percent. If you look at our “top two box” customer satisfaction numbers, they are well over 90 percent.

Kris Polly: What should every person in your service area know about Denver Water?

Jim Lochhead: Denver Water’s employees are our most important assets. They are experts and driven by excellence and dedication. They are there for our customers every hour of every day. If there’s a main break in the middle of January at 3:00 a.m. at 20 degrees below zero, our employees are out there standing in the freezing water so that people can get up in the morning and have water. Our employees have a passion for our mission and a first-responder mentality.

Additionally, at Denver Water, we have an ethic of doing the right thing for our customers and the environment.

Integrity and trust are precious commodities that we value and take very seriously.

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Lean Program Transforming Denver Water Denver Water implemented its lean program in 2012 to create more value for customers by eliminating nonessential processes. Lean is an adaptation of the Toyota Production System: a method of continuous improvement that challenges employees to constantly focus on enhanced efficiency, safety, and customer service. A lean organization recognizes customer value and focuses its key processes to continuously improve it.

To date, employees implementing lean techniques have saved Denver Water and its customers over $5 million, reduced injuries by 35 percent, and increased the productivity of pipe installation by 70 percent.

How Lean Works Denver Water uses lean-supported rapid improvement events (RIEs), “just do its,” and long-term projects to accomplish objectives. Employees can quickly streamline a process by participating in an RIE, which is usually a weeklong event in which groups of 8 to 10 employees tackle a specific process. Projects, on the other hand, may require longer-term implementation processes that involve more people and may require capital resources. It is important to note that lean relies on Denver Water’s internal experts, not management or outside entities, to make improvements and changes.

How Lean Supports the Strategic Plan Each year, Denver Water’s board and executive team review its strategic plan and identify major areas to focus on during the coming one to three years. While

lean will eventually reach every part of the organization and become an integral part of Denver Water’s culture, early implementation has focused on key areas of the organization’s strategic plan.

For 2015, the following objectives were identified: • Redevelop the operations complex in a way that is fiscally responsible, integrates field and administrative staff, creates a public presence, and celebrates water and the history of Denver Water.

• Align budget development and execution with strategic priorities and True North metrics.

• Incorporate processes to control spending.

• Become the employer of the future, one that retains and attracts top talent through integrated procedures, policies, benefits, and philosophies that create a unique, diverse, and energizing culture.

• Reduce lost-time accidents to zero.

• Improve top-box customer satisfaction by 10 percent.

• Strive for efficient, effective, customer-driven processes in everything Denver Water does.

Maintaining High Standards Lean is not about downsizing and is not about doing things cheaply. As employees examine the processes that have been created over time, they may find that some areas have more resources than needed while other areas are undersupported. In some situations, employees may be reassigned to different jobs or to other areas of the organization. Regardless of any lean outcomes, Denver Water aims to maintain the highest standards in every area.



TrueNorth NorthMetrics Metrics through September True through September 2015 2015 $6.0

Cumulative

Metric

Savings1,2

Hard savings

Soft savings

Customer satisfaction (Overall satisfaction)

$5.0

$5,172,000

Millions

$4.0

Employee satisfaction (Overall satisfaction)

$3.0 $2.0

Unplanned outages (Customer hours)

$1,456,000



Doing well

Year-to-date actual

Needs improvement

Year-to-date target

0%

20%

0%

20%

0

Actual to Target 40%

60%

80%

100%

40%

60%

80%

100%

10,000

20,000

30,000

$1.0 Jan-12 May-12 Sep-12 Jan-13 May-13 Sep-13 Jan-14 May-14 Sep-14 Jan-15 May-15 Sep-15

Total Operating Expense per Account3,4 Operations Expense

$65 $55

$42.89

Cycle-time reduction (Percentage)

$49.07

$45.78

$45

0

Injuries (Number)

Linear (Operations Expense)

$58.36

0

Lost work injuries (Number)

$0.0



0%

5

20

10

40

15

60

50%

20

80

100

100%

$39.66

$35 $25 $15

12

$34.99

Notes

$33.16 $35.86

1Full

time equivalent savings are counted on a monthly basis. savings are an indicator of organizational efficiency and not of specific future hard dollar savings. retirement, debt and miscellaneous expenses not part of normal operations and overhead allocations were excluded.

4Adjusted for inflation 2Soft

3Contract,

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A contractor lifts a 66-inch diameter polyurethane coated and cement-mortar-lined water pipe produced from American steel by the Northwest Pipe Company for the SDS project. More than 7,000 pieces of pipe were placed for the 50-mile pipeline.

Colorado’s Southern Delivery System:

Transporting Water for the Future

An exciting new regional water delivery project is nearing completion in Colorado and should begin delivering water to customers in 2016. According to John Fredell, Southern Delivery System (SDS) program director at Colorado Springs Utilities (CSU), “Planning for the SDS began nearly 20 years ago as part of a water resource plan developed by CSU. It called for conservation, non-potable water development, existing system improvements, and a major water delivery system.

The plan envisioned that the SDS would take advantage of water rights Colorado Springs already owned and store water in an existing reservoir about 50 miles to the south.”

As part of Phase 1 of the SDS, CSU built a new outlet works at Pueblo Dam to connect to Pueblo Reservoir, which is fed by the Arkansas River. From that connection, 50 miles of polyurethane-coated and cement-mortar-lined steel water transmission pipe runs north to Colorado Springs. The water travels uphill about 1,500 feet in elevation, pushed by three raw water pump stations located along the pipeline to a new water treatment plant in Colorado Springs.

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Southern Colorado’s future requires water. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, El Paso County is now the second most populous county in Colorado. Southern Colorado has a dry climate and is prone to periods of severe drought. The SDS will provide another means to deliver water from different sources, and the reservoirs planned as part of phase 2 of the SDS project will provide more storage closer to the community.

Mr. Fredell explained, “Each of these segments was built with the future in mind. There is a plan for incremental expansion as our community grows. Critical components of the project were built first, making the project more affordable for our community. Phase 2 will be built when the demand for water increases and more capacity is needed. This future phase will include two reservoirs and expanded capacity of the raw water pump stations and the water treatment plant.”

SDS will deliver up to 50 million gallons per day (mgd) to Colorado Springs and the neighboring communities of Fountain and Security. In addition, Pueblo West Metropolitan District, a nearby 49-squareMunicipal Water Leader

mile community, will receive up to 18 mgd through SDS-related infrastructure. CSU delivers water to about 460,000 people in Colorado Springs and the surrounding communities and military bases.

Knowing that stakeholders would closely scrutinize a project costing almost $1 billion, project leadership set out to bring value to the project every step of the way. Once construction began, SDS leadership balanced competing interests. Mr. Fredell explained, “Every work package was scrutinized. The ‘needs’ of the project were prioritized over the ‘wants’ of management and the engineers.”

Managing a project the size of the SDS also required innovative and rigorous program management.

Multidisciplinary teams were assigned to more than 20 individual work packages. At the center of each team was a project manager from CSU, supported by a design or delivery engineer from a private sector firm. A group of professionals supported the program manager and engineer and advised and led the team from the perspective of their own disciplines, including safety, permitting and environmental, public involvement, land acquisition, procurement, scheduling, and law. Mr. Fredell stated, “For consistency, all of CSU’s program managers reported to Keith Riley, the CSU Deputy program director for the SDS.” Engaging suppliers in the project was a strategic decision. SDS staff performed more than 200 presentations to promote awareness among community groups, chambers of commerce, and others about ways the business community could get involved in the program.

According to Mr. Fredell, “The project required effort to balance competing interests: for example, the costs associated with financing the project versus the needs of the project’s life cycle or desire to deliver a project that would last for generations. We had to balance these needs.”

Financing the project was a challenge. CSU’s leadership evaluated a number of different construction time frames and the associated rate effects and balanced them with the need for water. Mr. Fredell explained, “A project the size of the SDS meant that bond investors and rating agencies needed a rate funding commitment to ensure adequate security for bond repayments. We concluded that a construction schedule bringing the project online in 2016 leveled out rate increases, helped avoid sharp annual increases, and delivered the water when it was needed.

This schedule provided the necessary balance between resource reliability and customer impact.”

The SDS team not only met the engineering and financial challenges of such an undertaking, but also successfully met environmental challenges. SDS required more than 200 permits and approvals to start construction.

In addition to the environmental impact statement Municipal Water Leader

required under the National Environmental Policy Act, SDS required dozens of other permits and approvals, including local land-use permits, a section 404 permit required under the Clean Water Act, state water quality 401 certification, and a state fish and wildlife mitigation plan. Mr. Fredell stated, “We developed a team of environmental professionals with a wide range of expertise.

Also, we created a comprehensive system to manage all permit requirements. The system would schedule due dates and reminders so that we could ensure compliance.”

Water is the lifeblood of economic health, critical to attracting and retaining jobs and business in many communities. Local business and industry stepped up to get involved with the SDS. Mr. Fredell explained, “Project leadership committed to ensuring that at least 30 percent of the work went to local businesses. Construction tasks were divided into more than 20 separate work packages to spur local bidding and competition. The team held 18 business outreach workshops in three Colorado counties to advertise the work packages and trades needed and to connect subcontractors and suppliers with prime contractors. The SDS has provided tremendous benefit to the local and state economy, providing jobs and contracts to hundreds of local businesses. With most of the construction completed, approximately $564 million, or about 82 percent, of the SDS budget spent through September 2015 had gone to Colorado businesses.”

There are many lessons the CSU leadership team believes other water entities can learn from the planning, design, and construction of the SDS. Mr. Fredell stated, “[First], get your community on board and keep them on board—we had to educate our community on every facet of our program and update them regularly to earn their trust and support. [Second], hire smart. SDS required a wide range of expertise. We hired the smartest people, clearly explained our goals and vision, and then gave them the latitude to help us achieve that. We staffed diverse teams to ensure every perspective was considered on every work package. [Third], be willing to make tough decisions. Instead of sticking with the road well traveled, SDS leadership was not afraid to make changes in the project design, engineering, component siting, procurement process, contracts, and contractors. Very little was set in stone. That’s one of the main reasons the project is coming in $160 million under budget. At each step of the project, we asked, ‘Is that the best way to approach this?’ and ‘Is this the best use of our customer’s money?’”

For more information about the SDS, contact John Fredell at (855) 737‑4968.

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Building on Success LEGISLATIVE PROFILE

By Congressman Bill Shuster

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Water resources development projects play a valuable role for the nation in promoting waterborne transportation, appropriate flood protection measures, and aquatic ecosystem restoration activities. These projects mean good American jobs and a strong physical platform for the U.S. economy.

From the earliest days of the nation, there has been a clear and consistent federal role and national interest in developing, maintaining, and supporting a vital water transportation network. This system connects American consumers, manufacturers, and farmers to domestic and world markets. Without action, the demands of a growing trade volume will quickly exceed the capacity of our current infrastructure.

In addition to oversight of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers’ programs and projects, the House Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure places a high priority on the enactment of a Water Resources Development Act (WRDA) every two years. This legislation typically contains project authorizations, modifications and deauthorizations, program revisions and policy initiatives, and related provisions involving Corps activities.

WRDA should matter to every American, because its success will help improve the U.S. economy and quality of life and ensure that American products remain competitive.

In 2014, Congress overwhelmingly enacted bipartisan water resources reform legislation to promote America’s competitiveness, prosperity, and economic growth. The Water Resources Reform and Development Act of 2014 (WRRDA) authorized the Corps to carry out its missions to develop, maintain, and support the nation’s vital port and waterway infrastructure needs and to support effective and targeted flood protection and environmental restoration needs. WRRDA was also the most policy- and reformfocused measure of its kind in decades and the most fiscally responsible water resources bill in history.

It cut red tape; reformed the federal bureaucracy; accelerated project delivery; and more than fully offset authorizations for needed infrastructure improvements by deauthorizing unnecessary, outdated projects.

WRRDA supports our water transportation network to keep our nation competitive, improves the flow of commerce, and provides a foundation for job growth. Today, the Corps maintains more than 25,000 miles of channels for commercial navigation and operates 236 locks at 192 sites. The average age of

these locks is almost 60 years, and more than half the locks are over 50 years old. The Corps also maintains 300 deep commercial harbors and 600 shallow coastal and inland harbors, most of which are not operated and maintained to face the realities of a 21st century economy.

We look to build on the success of WRRDA and pass the next bipartisan water resources development legislation, one of the committee’s highest priorities in 2016. The next WRDA bill will again strive to balance competing demands on water resources as we continue to authorize projects and programs related to navigation, flood damage reduction, aquatic ecosystem restoration, and other project purposes.

We look forward to continuing to work together with all stakeholders and listen to all viewpoints to enact a Water Resources Development Act of 2016.

Congressman Bill Shuster (R-PA) is the chairman of the House Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure.

He has represented Pennsylvania’s 9th congressional district since 2001. Prior to his public service, Congressman Shuster worked on his family’s farm in Bedford County; for the Goodyear Tire and Rubber Corporation; and for Bandag Incorporated, where he served as district manager.

He also owned and operated an automobile dealership in East Freedom, Pennsylvania.

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MANAGER PROFILE

Eric Wilkinson, Northern Colorado Water Conservancy District Eric Wilkinson has been the general manager of the Northern Colorado Water Conservancy District (Northern Water) since January 1994. He served as the South Platte basin representative on the Colorado Water Conservation Board (CWCB) from 2000 to 2012. In 2003 and in 2011, he served as chairman of CWCB. Mr. Wilkinson also serves on various advisory boards and committees and is on the board of directors of the Colorado Water Congress.

He is a former dam inspector with the State Engineer’s Office, worked for the City of Greeley as a water resources engineer, and served as the deputy water commissioner for the Cache la Poudre River in 1972.

Mr. Wilkinson has a bachelor’s degree in civil engineering from Colorado State University and is a registered professional engineer in Colorado. He was born and raised in the Fort Collins area, where he currently resides.

Municipal Water Leader’s editor-in-chief, Kris Polly, spoke with Mr. Wilkinson about providing water resources management, project operations, and conservation services to meet the growing needs of Northern Water’s beneficiaries, now and in the future.

Kris Polly: Please tell us about Northern Water’s history, mission, and service area.

Eric Wilkinson: Northern Water was born from an effort by the Northern Colorado Water Users’ Association during the drought and the depression of the 1930s to pursue additional water supplies for the area in northeastern Colorado that is now included within the boundaries of the district. In September 1937, under the authority of the Water Conservancy Act passed by the Colorado state legislature earlier that year, Northern Water became Colorado’s first conservancy district.

In July 1938, Northern Water signed a contract with the federal government for the construction of the Colorado–Big Thompson (CBT) Project. Construction began on the project that year and continued until 1957, when it went into full operation. The CBT Project delivers about 217,000 acre-feet of water a year from the Colorado River headwaters for beneficial use within the boundaries of the district. Working in partnership with the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation, our mission is to manage and deliver the water that is yielded by the CBT Project. The project’s primary purpose is to provide a reliable water supply while maximizing the generation of hydropower from the 22

water diverted by and delivered through the project.

Northern Water can best be described as a water supplier and a raw water provider. There are 1.6 million acres of land within district boundaries, 640,000 of which are irrigated. We have about 2,400 individuals or entities that own allotment contracts for project water. The water is delivered to a combination of irrigation, municipal, domestic, and industrial users. Our municipal subdistrict, under full demand, will deliver roughly 48,000 acre-feet annually from the Windy Gap Project.

Kris Polly: Can you please describe the CBT Project and how it works?

Eric Wilkinson: The CBT Project is the largest water collection and diversion system in Colorado. It consists of 12 reservoirs, 35 miles of tunnels, 95 miles of canals, 7 hydroelectric power plants, and 700 miles of transmission lines. Water from the headwaters of the Colorado River flows into the project’s West Slope collection facilities, which include Grand Lake (the largest natural lake in Colorado), Shadow Mountain Reservoir, and Granby Reservoir (the second-largest reservoir in Colorado). Project reserves are held in Granby Reservoir on the West Slope and Horsetooth Municipal Water Leader

and Carter Lake Reservoirs on the East Slope.

The Alva B. Adams Tunnel connects CBT Project West Slope collection facilities to the project’s East Slope facilities. The tunnel is 13.1 miles long with a diameter of 9.75 feet and a capacity of 550 cubic feet per second.

It was bored from 1940 to 1944 and then concrete lined from 1944 to 1947, taking a total of seven years to construct. At the time of its completion, it was the longest underground water delivery tunnel in the United States bored from two headings. Historians say the two headings, when they met, were off only by the width of a coin. It was an impressive engineering feat. At that time, survey equipment obviously didn’t have the sophisticated technology of today. Engineers surveyed at night, siting with lanterns located on mountaintops to triangulate the correct alignment of the two headings.

The tunnel conveys water to the East Slope. The water then falls through a series of penstocks and powerplants to be delivered directly for beneficial use or stored in the project’s two East Slope terminal storage reservoirs.

There are project powerplants upstream of Mary’s Lake, Lake Estes, and Flatiron Reservoir. After the water is conveyed through the Flatiron Powerplant, which is the last in a series of power drops totaling 2,600 vertical feet, it is either delivered to Horsetooth Reservoir, the north

Municipal Water Leader

terminal storage reservoir, or it is pumped up to Carter Lake Reservoir, the south terminal storage reservoir. From these reservoirs, water is released into the project’s water delivery system. Using the combination of the project’s delivery system, natural waterways, irrigation canals, and our allottees’ delivery systems, project water can be delivered as far north as the town of Wellington, as far south as the city of Broomfield, and as far east as the town of Fort Morgan.

Kris Polly: Would you please describe Northern Water’s hydropower developments and projects and how they benefit your water supply activities?

Eric Wilkinson: In 2012, we commissioned Northern Water’s first hydroelectric plant, the Trout Hydropower Plant, located below Carter Lake; the plant is named in honor of Robert V. Trout, a great man who served as Northern Water’s legal counsel for many years. The 2.6-megawatt facility utilizes water delivered from Carter Lake to municipal and domestic allottees served by our Southern Water Supply Project as well as water delivered in the summer to our irrigators through the project’s delivery system.

Northern Water was able to add hydropower because

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(1) we constructed a 120‑mile‑long pipeline out of Carter Lake Reservoir from 1993 to 1998 that serves the year-round municipal and domestic water demand for 15 entities; and (2) we had a great cooperative and collaborative effort with Reclamation that allowed Northern Water to construct, at its own expense, a new outlet at Carter Lake to better serve the needs of our water users served by the Southern Water Supply Project. These factors provided Northern Water with the opportunity to incorporate into the construction of the new outlet the infrastructure necessary to add the Trout Hydropower Plant. We estimate that the project will pay for itself during the next 20 years. The economics are also facilitated by the fact that in Colorado, there are different rates for renewable energy such as hydropower.

We are currently in the midst of constructing a 1.3-megawatt hydropower plant below Granby Dam. It will also be sustained by renewable energy rates, and we estimate that the construction will also pay for itself in 20 years. At full operation, these projects will produce 12 million kilowatt-hours per year.

Kris Polly: Your annual report describes 2014 as a record water year, with much of your reservoir storage at or near capacity. How are water conditions this year?

Eric Wilkinson: Water conditions were very good in 2015 because of the amount of carryover storage from 2014. In 2015, we entered the springtime with belownormal snowpack, both on the West Slope and the East Slope, and that concerned us. However, we were confident that project storage reserves would be sufficient to carry us through the year.

As we know, Mother Nature sometimes surprises us.

This year’s “Miracle May” brought 2 to 4 more inches of rainfall than normal. It was perfect timing for the germination of crops. Irrigation was not necessary during the months of May and most of June because of heavierthan-normal precipitation. Since agricultural irrigation was not necessary during peak runoff, our water users had excess water they could put in storage. In regard to the CBT Project, 190,000 acre-feet of water flowed into the project’s West Slope collection facilities and spilled downstream in the Colorado River. This event marked the third-largest spill of water in the history of the project.

Streamflows returned to normal levels in July and August.

Kris Polly: Please tell our readers about the Windy Gap Firming Project and its key component, the Chimney Hollow Reservoir.

Eric Wilkinson: Windy Gap is a water supply project owned and operated by our municipal subdistrict for the 24

Granby Hydropower, still under construction at the base of Lake Granby Dam. The hydropower plant is scheduled to be online June 1, 2016.

benefit of the project’s 15 allottees. It diverts water from the Colorado River downstream of its confluence with the Fraser River. It pumps water up about 600 vertical feet through a 6-mile-long pipeline into the CBT Project’s Granby Reservoir, then uses the CBT Project infrastructure to deliver water to Windy Gap’s project participants on the East Slope. This is done under the authority of a carriage contract involving Reclamation, Northern Water, and the municipal subdistrict.

Due to financial constraints, storage wasn’t constructed with the rest of the Windy Gap Project. The original environmental impact statement (EIS) documented that the Windy Gap Project participants would either use existing storage or build additional storage to ensure a reliable or firm yield from the Windy Gap Project. Since the construction of the Windy Gap Project, the only storage available has been unused storage capacity in Granby Reservoir, made available through the carriage contract.

It is important to understand that the Windy Gap project has junior water rights ranging from 1967 to 1980 for a total diversion of 600 cubic feet per second from the Colorado River. In those years when stream flows are low, Windy Gap is not in priority and cannot divert water. Moreover, in high water years when CBT’s Granby Reservoir spills, there is no unused capacity to accommodate the storage of the Windy Gap Project water.

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Aerial view of the Chimney Hollow Reservoir site. East of the valley is Carter Lake, and in the forefront is Flatiron Reservoir.

In the late 1990s, after a wet period in the Colorado River basin, 13 of the 15 participants in the Windy Gap Project united to collaboratively and cooperatively build a storage project of sufficient capacity to provide 30,000 acre-feet of firm yield to those participants.

Chimney Hollow Reservoir, located immediately west of Carter Lake Reservoir, is designed to connect to the CBT Project conveyance facilities to allow delivery of Windy Gap Project water into it. The reservoir also allows releases from it to be reintroduced back into the CBT Project for delivery to Windy Gap allottees under the authority of a recently executed carriage contract between Reclamation, Northern Water, and the municipal subdistrict. Chimney Hollow will have a capacity of 90,000 acre-feet, sufficient to provide about 30,000 acre-feet of firm yield.

There are 13 participants that have varying levels of capacity in the Windy Gap Firming Project. Chimney Hollow Reservoir will store water during years of abundance to provide additional supplies during dry years.

The firming project will provide dedicated storage to the Windy Gap Project, something the participants don’t have now because their ability to store Windy Gap Project water is dependent on the availability of unused capacity in the CBT project.

Kris Polly: What are the biggest challenges for Northern Water in the coming years?

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Eric Wilkinson: Our biggest challenges are trying to finish the two large water projects that are needed to keep pace with growing water demands. In addition to the Windy Gap Firming Project, we are also working on the Northern Integrated Supply Project (NISP). We are engaged in the NISP on behalf of 15 participants, including cities, towns, and water districts along the Front Range north of Denver, that are all growing rapidly and need water for their future. The NISP is designed to provide about 40,000 acre-feet of firm yield to the project participants.

We have been in the National Environmental Policy Act compliance stage for the NISP since early 2004.

This summer the supplemental draft of the EIS was completed. NISP participants have spent $15 million to date on the EIS studies. The final EIS is currently being drafted by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. We hope to see it completed by 2017 and to begin construction soon thereafter.

Another big challenge is the operation and maintenance of the CBT Project, as well as the protection of its water rights and supplies. We must ensure the delivery of the project’s water in a reliable manner, which is an increasing challenge given that many parts of the project’s infrastructure are more than 60 years old. There are many challenges associated with the maintenance of aging infrastructure and ensuring that project yield is 25

sustained. We must also be much more mindful of water quality considerations.

Kris Polly: What are your greatest achievements over the last several years?

Eric Wilkinson: I think one of Northern Water’s greatest attributes is its ability to serve the needs of its constituents through the development, construction, operation, and maintenance of a number of projects. What we are trying to do is adapt to the evolution of this area to meet the agricultural requirements of the region and satisfy municipal, domestic, and industrial water needs.

It’s a balancing act: It will continue to evolve, and we will continue to attempt to meet those evolutionary challenges.

Kris Polly: What advice do you have for members of Congress and other decisionmakers involved with water resources policy?

Eric Wilkinson: Water resources issues are best addressed and managed at the local, regional, and state levels. Local entities know best how to manage their water supplies and available water resources. For example,

Colorado is a party to nine different decrees of equitable apportionment or interstate compacts, some of which involve the Colorado River. The State of Colorado has worked exceptionally well with the other Colorado River basin states to enhance the management of the Colorado River, and we have done so largely without the heavy hand of the federal government. The federal government needs to find ways to help facilitate the management of the nation’s water resources by local, regional, or state entities rather than regulate how that management occurs.

Kris Polly: What should everyone know about Northern Water?

Eric Wilkinson: Northern Water takes its charge very seriously. We feel that we have been entrusted with a great asset that we need to manage in the best possible way for our constituents, the region and state, and our water users.

We are always striving to improve the way we do business by maintaining transparency, conducting public education, and gathering public input. We strive to evolve to meet the needs of our communities and constituents. We are always seeking to protect our resources and manage them to the best benefit of our region and our state.

The Chimney Hollow Reservoir site. Flatiron Reservoir can be viewed in the distance, it is a part of the Colorado-Big Thompson Project.

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Scott Potter, President of the Association ASSOCIATION PROFILE

of Metropolitan Water Agencies

Scott Potter is the director of Metro Water Services in Nashville, Tennessee. The utility produces an average of 100 million gallons of drinking water and collects and processes 115 million gallons of wastewater daily.

Metro Water Services is also responsible for storm water and watershed management for Nashville and Davidson Counties.

Mr. Potter currently serves as president of the Association of Metropolitan Water Agencies (AMWA).

He is also an adjunct mathematics instructor at Belmont University, a member of the Vanderbilt University Mechanical Engineering Department External Advisory Committee, and a member of the board of the Water Research Foundation.

Mr. Potter served 12 years in the U.S. Navy as a surface warfare officer aboard the destroyers U.S.S. Cochrane, stationed in Yokosuka, Japan, and U.S.S. Callaghan, stationed in San Diego, California. He deployed to the Persian Gulf in 1987 and to the northern Persian Gulf in 1993.

Mr. Potter has a bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering from Vanderbilt University and a master’s degree in mechanical engineering from the Naval Postgraduate School in Monterey, California. He is a licensed professional engineer in Kentucky, Tennessee, and Virginia. Mr. Potter has been married to his wife, Melissa, for 26 years. They have three children.

Municipal Water Leader’s writer, Valentina Valenta, spoke with Mr. Potter about the nation’s drinking water industry, the importance of putting a renewed emphasis on source water protection, and what AMWA is doing to enhance and expand the tools used by municipal utilities to successfully meet America’s drinking water needs.

Valentina Valenta: Please tell us about your role at AMWA. Scott Potter: I am the president of AMWA. In that position, I focus on ensuring that the association is a strong, engaged organization that successfully represents the needs of the nation’s larger municipally owned and operated drinking water systems.

Valentina Valenta: For our readers who are not familiar with AMWA, please provide a description of the association’s history, mission, and membership.

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Scott Potter: The association was formed in 1981 by a group of general managers of metropolitan water systems who wanted to ensure that the issues of large, publicly owned drinking water suppliers would be represented in Washington, DC. Our member utilities span the United States, serving 140 million customers from Anchorage, Alaska, to Miami, Florida. AMWA is the nation’s only policymaking organization dedicated solely to metropolitan drinking water suppliers. Our member utilities are represented in the association by their general managers and chief executive officers (CEOs). These leaders of large water utilities work collectively on a full range of drinking water concerns.

Valentina Valenta: Can you please summarize AMWA’s top priorities for our readers?

Scott Potter: AMWA is currently focused on several priorities. First, we advocate for science-based Municipal Water Leader

decisionmaking. AMWA seeks to ensure that sound science and knowledge feed the federal decisionmaking process.

AMWA has a strong presence on Capitol Hill to make sure all our congressional representatives understand the issues facing drinking water systems. We want to make sure that Congress has the information it needs to help set policies that may affect our utilities.

Second, as an organization composed of general managers and CEOs of public drinking water systems, a major focus is to improve utility operations. AMWA has a utility management program that develops tools for municipal water system executives to provide a way for them to benchmark performance and to identify specific initiatives that can be employed to improve every level of management and leadership. Our utility management program focuses on management techniques, operations, and financial sustainability.

And third, we have a drinking water security program that coordinates its efforts directly with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) to ensure that our drinking water systems are as safe as they can possibly be.

Valentina Valenta: Among AMWA’s legislative priorities is support for removing the current prohibition on using Water Infrastructure Finance and Innovation Authority (WIFIA) loans and guarantees with tax exempt municipal bonds to finance projects. Can you describe AMWA’s involvement in WIFIA’s implementation and evaluation of WIFIA as an important financing tool to help municipalities?

Scott Potter: AMWA worked collectively as a group of executives to make sure it has the information necessary to characterize how WIFIA can be successful. We worked very closely with members of Congress and their staffs to advocate for WIFIA, and I think AMWA’s close cooperation with Capitol Hill resulted in the passage of the WIFIA pilot program that was signed into law in 2014.

Right now, we are working to ensure that Congress reforms WIFIA to allow it to assist projects that also receive funding via tax-exempt municipal bond issuances, since this combination of funding sources is necessary to make the program viable for most large water systems.

WIFIA is a mechanism for funding large expense capital improvement. It is not a competitor to the Drinking Water State Revolving Fund (DWSRF). It’s important to remember that major metropolitan water systems often have infrastructure projects that exceed $20 million. While very beneficial for smaller projects, the DWSRF does not help larger utilities fund major capital expenditures. The big difference between WIFIA and the DWSRF is that the average loan value of the latter has been determined to be Municipal Water Leader

roughly $2.4 million. So developing a finance program that will assist us in rebuilding larger, more expensive systems will be good for our customers and good for the nation.

Valentina Valenta: AMWA’s 2014 annual report states, “AMWA responded to some water incidents in West Virginia and Ohio by emphasizing opportunities for increased source water protection, an area that has been traditionally under-represented in regulatory discussions.”

What is source water protection and why do we need renewed attention on this issue?

Scott Potter: Source water protection is very important from our perspective. The concept is all about keeping pollutants out of streams, rivers, lakes, aquifers, and any drinking water source that is used for community drinking water needs. When we keep pollutants out of the source of our drinking water, it is better for the environment and better for water treatment. Step 1 of the drinking water treatment process is always source water protection. If we must treat drinking water intensively before it reaches the tap, our environment suffers. By focusing on source water first, we can concurrently enhance our ability to keep harmful pollutants out of drinking water supplies and protect the environment.

At times, drinking water or source water contamination is completely out of our control. For example, in 2014, contaminants from a chemical storage tank in Charleston, West Virginia, leaked into the river that supplies drinking water for the area’s 300,000 customers. Chemical leaks are not uncommon sources of pollution in source waters across the United States. In the Charleston incident, AMWA worked very closely with Congress to develop legislation

AMWA encourages its member utilities to follow best practices in water utility operations. By using preventive maintenance like the Cured-in-Place Pipe program, the Prince William County Service Authority in Virginia adds decades of life to its sewer mains and saves millions of dollars in potential infrastructure costs.

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that would require chemical storage companies to keep water utilities informed about chemical substances that are upstream of the intakes so managers can be better prepared to respond to potential leaks.

Other times, the contamination of the source water occurs naturally. For example, Lake Erie experiences very significant algal blooms due to nutrient-rich runoff from farmlands. The runoff from these farms contains nitrogen and phosphorus, which increase the growth of the algae in the water. The algae produces a toxin called microcystin that is very harmful if ingested. This is a tough issue, but we are working with Congress and EPA to effectively address it.

AMWA has a wonderful relationship with Congress.

We do a lot of work educating federal decisionmakers on issues such as source water protection because they may not be aware of the challenges utilities face. The Charleston chemical spill was a very visible threat to drinking water supply, but threats often are not as visible. So, AMWA has a strong presence on Capitol Hill to make sure our policymakers are informed.

Valentina Valenta: What are AMWA and drinking water utilities doing from a policy perspective to keep our water safe?

Scott Potter: In 2002, Congress authorized the creation of the Water Information Sharing and Analysis Center (WaterISAC) to keep drinking water and wastewater utility managers informed about potential threats and risks to the nation’s water infrastructure from all hazards, such as intentional contamination, terrorism, and cybercrime, and to provide knowledge about response, mitigation, and resilience. AMWA established and maintains WaterISAC for all drinking water and wastewater systems, as well as relevant state and federal entities. It provides an online directory of security resources and a database on chemical and biological agents. It is important to stress that WaterISAC works very closely with EPA and DHS to ensure that the water sector is not operating in a silo.

AMWA and WaterISAC have appointees on the Water Sector Coordinating Council, a body of utility managers who advise EPA and DHS on the security needs of the water sector. September 11, 2001, introduced a whole new level of security awareness in our industry, and through WaterISAC, we are working to identify how we can improve physical security, such as barriers to dams and reservoirs, as well as cybersecurity, security of supervisory control and data acquisition, and other nonphysical threats.

Valentina Valenta: What is the biggest challenge faced by drinking water utilities today, and what should members of Congress and other decisionmakers be doing to help them?

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Scott Potter: Infrastructure repair and replacement is the industry’s biggest challenge. Congress can help water utilities by fully implementing and funding WIFIA. As a new and complementary source of funding to the DWSRF, WIFIA will enable us to take advantage of another loan mechanism to achieve significant capital improvement to our drinking water systems.

AMWA also focuses on reducing energy consumption and increasing water system efficiency. There is clearly a nexus between drinking water and energy. If we can use less energy to treat and distribute drinking water, we will be able to reduce costs for our customers. This is just one more type of infrastructure rehabilitation that we need to develop.

Though our utilities are working as hard as possible to repair and replace our major drinking water infrastructure, we need a more coordinated approach through Congress to help us tackle the capital improvement we need to complete over the next century.

Valentina Valenta: What are some of AMWA’s other long-term priorities?

Scott Potter: Resilience and climate adaptation are among the top long-term priorities for AMWA. We view resilience as our ability to maintain successful operations in the short term by developing the capability to react to significant events over a long planning horizon. So, AMWA helps utilities to be both resilient in the short term and adaptive in the long term. We are seeing the effects of climate adaptation requirements, and AMWA will work together with utilities, Congress, and EPA to ensure that water systems are resilient and able to adapt to changes in our environment. Some AMWA member utilities have very strong construction methods and capital planning programs, which demonstrate their commitment to sustainable operation. If you can build sustainable infrastructure, it will increase your ability to be resilient.

As I mentioned, another priority for AMWA is source water protection. I cannot stress enough the importance of protecting and managing source water first. Source water protection allows us to improve water quality and reduce expenses to treat point source and non–point source pollution. AMWA also strives to ensure the protection of water quality. It is our fundamental mission to make sure that the nation’s drinking water utilities have the information and ability to be absolutely certain that the drinking water running out of their customers’ taps is safe.

We also think about our water within the context of the watershed. Water is not independent from its environment.

We need to manage it as part of a cycle, from the time it falls out of the sky to when it hits the ground, gets to a stream, flows to an intake, hits the tap, and then goes into the wastewater system to get treated before going back into the environment. This cyclical, one water approach, Municipal Water Leader

Sustainable water utility management is a key issue for AMWA. Freeport Intake on the Sacramento River reflects sustainable management by AMWA member East Bay Municipal Utility District, allowing delivery of up to 100 million gallons per day of supplemental water supplies from the river to the district's customers during a drought.

beginning with source water protection, is key for AMWA. Another priority is drinking water regulation. In addition to its strong presence on Capitol Hill, AMWA also has a great working relationship with federal agencies. We work very closely with EPA, DHS, and any other federal agency that has jurisdiction over drinking water to make sure that rules and regulations are based on science and implemented within a framework that allows public utilities to maintain management of their water resources.

Valentina Valenta: Please tell our readers about some of AMWA’s greatest achievements over the last several years.

Scott Potter: AMWA is a leader on water issues. For example, this month we are hosting the 2015 International Water and Climate Forum in San Diego, California, to bring together the interests of AMWA members and international drinking water managers. Some countries have had struggles that are similar to ours, and some face challenges that are very different. We can learn from both.

A good example is climate adaptation. Australia has had major droughts and significant rain events. Our western members in particular can learn a lot from Australia’s responses to its challenges. European utilities have very interesting ways of dealing with sea-level rise and undertaking infrastructure renewal. We are trying to pool our resources and further demonstrate that the industry is working together, not just nationally, but internationally. We Municipal Water Leader

are discussing how agencies around the world are adapting to climate issues.

We also developed a utility financial information database for our members that houses years of financial information about comparable utilities so that we can benchmark best practices and pool our knowledge.

Oftentimes, one utility will be facing a financial situation that another utility may be able to answer.

AMWA is a member of the Value of Water Coalition, which is working to increase awareness of water issues, particularly the need for infrastructure investment. The coalition hosts a lot of events and activities around the country to raise public awareness of the importance of water in all aspects of our lives.

AMWA’s fundamental success is based on the nature of the organization we created. The association provides a forum for senior leaders of major drinking water utilities across the nation to come together and learn from each other. For example, we have two conferences: one in the spring focused on legislative and regulatory issues, and one in the fall focused on management topics. As a member of AMWA, I am able to talk to my peers from all over the United States about the most pressing issues facing water utilities today. AMWA also gives us a collective voice when we work with Capitol Hill and the federal agencies.

Valentina Valenta: You have been and continue to be a leader in water resources management at Nashville Metro Water Services, and now you are sharing your leadership skills and vision with AMWA’s membership. What is the most important thing you have learned as the director of Metro Water?

Scott Potter: My own utility manages water, wastewater, and storm water. It is a one water utility. My job as the director of Nashville Metro is to constantly and thoroughly identify and mitigate risk in whatever form it appears, including financial, drinking water quality, or security. I am not unique in that endeavor. I think our member utilities generally view mitigation of risk as a major part of their job.

I view it as the single most important part of my job each day.

As president of AMWA, I am the leader of the group, but I am certainly not more qualified than any of our members. The best part of our association is that we have such a diverse group of members with tremendous amounts of experience and levels of qualification from every region of our country. I don’t have to bring anything other than my experiences to AMWA. The leadership is already there in the collective body of the organization. That is how AMWA really strengthens the drinking water industry.

Director of Nashville Metro Water Scott Potter can be reached at (615) 862-4555.

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BUSINESS LEADERS

PVC Pipe for Performance and Value to Water Utilities

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Our nation’s water infrastructure, the system that delivers drinking water, wastewater, and storm water to our communities, received a D grade from the American Society of Civil Engineers. The professional association reported that a large portion of the country’s water system is in poor to fair condition and is mostly below standard, with many of the pipes in the ground approaching the end of their service life.

Financially struggling municipalities and water utilities face enormous challenges due to aging, decaying water mains. Corrosion and breakage can disrupt water service, traffic, neighborhood commerce, and emergency services; result in the loss of valuable water; and undermine water quality. Polyvinyl chloride, or PVC, pipe can serve as an integral part of a utility’s strategy to reduce water leaks, pipe breaks, and associated water and wasted energy losses.

“According to a report by the National Taxpayers Union [NTU], iron pipe longevity is plummeting due to significant reductions in iron pipe wall thickness,”

says Dick Doyle, president and chief executive officer of the Vinyl Institute. “Couple this with the fact that corrosive soils affect 75 percent of our nation’s water infrastructure, and the seriousness of selecting proper piping systems that do not corrode becomes even more apparent.” Pipe networks are the largest component of a utility’s assets and significantly affect operation and maintenance costs, which are, according to a 2012 report by the Competitive Enterprise Institute, increasing annually at 6 percent above inflation because of the continued use of inferior iron pipe.

The conventional approach to water pipe replacement has been to merely replace the pipe with the same material regardless of price and performance. According to a 2013 U.S. Conference of Mayors report on municipal procurement, “The common practice of choosing metallic pipes without a full financial evaluation continues to dominate procurement decision-making.”

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Ratepayers end up footing the bill for leaked water, iron pipe maintenance, and premature pipe replacement. It’s an unsustainable proposition for communities.”

PVC pipes used for water mains perform the best of any commercially available pipes on the market today, according to Mr. Doyle. The Utah State study found that PVC pipes have the lowest break rates compared to other pipe materials, including cast iron, ductile iron, steel, and concrete, potentially saving billions of dollars over the life of the nation’s water systems. The advantages of PVC may also include more efficient and lower installation costs. The European Plastic Pipes and Fitting Association found that PVC sewer pipe could be installed 30 percent faster than conventional pipes.

Performance and Savings Associated With PVC Noncorrosive PVC pipe can achieve considerable replacement cost savings. A 2012 study by Utah State University’s Buried Structures Laboratory indicates that PVC pipe has a design life of 100 years or more. Additionally, the study showed that municipalities using PVC piping have experienced life cycle costs that are 30 to 70 percent lower than those of metallic pipe. According to a 2011 study by the American Water Works Association’s Water Research Foundation, ductile iron pipes with the thinnest walls (representing the majority of metallic pipe sold) in moderately corrosive soils have a life expectancy of only 11 to 14 years.

PVC’s corrosion resistance also helps reduce water main breaks. An estimated 300,000 water main breaks occur annually in the United States and Canada.

Leaking pipes lose roughly 2.6 trillion gallons of drinking water each year, according to the American Society of Civil Engineers.

Mr. Doyle says, “This loss is equal to 17 percent of all the water pumped in the United States and costs our economy more than $50 billion annually.

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Cities Realize Cost Savings for Ratepayers The City of Burton, Michigan, was recognized recently with the 2015 Innovation in Infrastructure and Technology award from the Genesee County Metropolitan Planning Commission for its five-year project to replace its corroding iron pipes with PVC. Burton Mayor Paula Zelenko stated recently in The Burton Review, “The City is looking to the future using PVC water main pipe, which is manufactured as a green product, requires less energy and fewer resources, and has a conservative life expectancy of at least 100 years.

Most importantly, because PVC pipe is non-corrosive, the quality of the water delivered to the residents is healthier than water carried by ductile iron. . . . Providing safe drinking water is a top priority for my administration. . . . The use of PVC will also allow the City to increase water pressure to the residents by an average of 25 pounds, further improving quality of life and increasing fire-fighting safety. The quality of the pipe and the expected longevity will also result in fewer interruptions in service. The use of PVC is saving the taxpayers of Burton $651,000.”

The City of Indianapolis, Indiana, found that PVC water pipe had a failure rate 2.5 times lower than traditional pipe materials, which resulted in significant cost savings for ratepayers. As a solution to corrosion and to reduce costs, Pleasanton, California, began using corrosion-proof PVC pipe in the mid-1980s because PVC does not need coatings, liners, or other materials to ensure strength or sustainability.

Pleasanton found PVC pipe to be about 70 percent cheaper than ductile iron pipe. Schenectady, New York, Mayor Brian Stratton, a former co-chair of the U.S. Conference of Mayors Water Council, stated in the May 2010 issue of U.S. Mayor, “The traditional habit of using one or two pipe materials exclusively is no longer satisfactory. Local officials need to compare all proven pipe materials on a life-cycle basis before choosing the best pipe for the city.”

NTU also reported savings. Mr. Doyle explains, “NTU estimates that replacing old‑fashioned cast iron pipe with 33

PVC would save an estimated $245 billion, or 11.5 percent of the total replacement value of all pipe. By replacing ductile iron pipe with PVC, the average cost savings is estimated at $126 billion, making up 5.9 percent of the total. A shift in pipe selection from old iron and ductile iron pipe materials to PVC pipe could reduce the current estimated total replacement value of iron metallic pipes from $1.36 trillion to $991 billion.”

Making Great Strides in Water Infrastructure Despite meeting or exceeding industry standards, some pipe materials are excluded from consideration during the procurement process. Considering all materials introduces competition and enables procurement decisions that provide the best water infrastructure for taxpayer dollars.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) has had success with this approach, achieving value for taxpayers in programs for rural water and sewer systems since the 1970s. Mr. Doyle said, “The Vinyl Institute and our colleagues at the PVC Pipe Association are asking that Congress replicate the USDA’s competitive procurement policies for funding of state and municipal water and sewer infrastructure projects.”

He also stated, “As well, we are very excited that the PVC pipe industry has completed the first International Organization for Standardization–compliant, peerreviewed, industry-wide Environmental Product 34

Declaration (EPD) for water and sewer pipes in North America, which benchmarks the impacts of PVC pipe products across their life cycles. It is fully transparent and verified by NSF International as an industry best practice.

(NSF International led the development of the American National Standards for all materials and products that treat or come in contact with drinking water. In 1990, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency replaced its own drinking water product advisory program with the NSF International standards.) PVC’s smooth interior surface minimizes energy consumption for pumping due to reduced friction forces, and its 100-year-plus life means that it has to be replaced less often, resulting in additional environmental impact reductions. Finally, the EPD unequivocally demonstrates that PVC pipe is the safest and most durable material over its lifetime for the distribution of clean water for public consumption.”

Dick Doyle is president and chief executive officer of the Vinyl Institute.

The Vinyl Institute servers as the collective voice for the vinyl industry engaging stakeholders in shaping its future. Mr. Doyle works very closely with the PVC Pipe Association. He can be reached at (202) 765-2280.

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The INNOVATORS

Water Quality Isolation in Wauneta, Nebraska In 2001, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) revised its drinking water standards for municipalities across the United States, replacing the old standard of 50 parts per billion with the new standard of 10 parts per billion. EPA directed community water systems and nontransient noncommunity water systems to comply with the revised standard by 2008.

After EPA released the new standard, a number of municipalities sampled their drinking water supplies and discovered that contaminant levels did not meet the new requirement. Some public water entities chose to build expensive water treatment plants or new wells to correct the problem. Other water utilities attempted to solve the problem by applying cost-effective technologies to reduce contaminant levels.

The Village of Wauneta, Nebraska, has been working steadfastly to comply with the new standard through a well rehabilitation project. Arsenic occurs naturally in the area’s groundwater. Water samples from Wauneta’s water supply currently range from 9.5 to 11 parts per billion.

In April 2015, the director of the Nebraska Department of Health and Human Services ordered Wauneta to require its public water system to ensure compliance with regulations. The order granted the Wauneta public water system an exemption from complying with the standard of 10 parts per billion until January 22, 2015.

In July 2014, GeoSpec Drilling, LLC, started working with the University of Nebraska–Lincoln and the State of Nebraska to determine whether well rehabilitation could potentially reduce contaminant levels in Wauneta’s drinking water supply. GeoSpec Drilling, LLC, and Clean Well Technology are currently studying the effects of injecting grout into the village’s existing wells to isolate the contaminants in the geological formation.

Municipal Water Leader’s editor-in-chief, Kris Polly, spoke with Bo Bonn, chief executive member of GeoSpec Drilling, LLC, and Bill Christopherson, vice president of Clean Well Technology, about their efforts to reduce arsenic levels in the water supply of Wauneta, Nebraska, and throughout the state.

Kris Polly: Please tell us about your project regarding well water in Wauneta, Nebraska.

Bo Bonn: Wauneta has a problem with arsenic in its water supply. We suspect this is naturally occurring arsenic and not related to man-made activities such as mining in the area. However, we do believe the method of construction of Wauneta’s wells has affected their water quality. A workover of 36

Abandonment of old public water system well in Wauneta, Nebraska.

Wauneta’s current water wells may provide a cost-effective means of reducing the arsenic in their water.

To accomplish this workover, a strategically placed grout seal must be installed. This method is an outgrowth of the 2010 Nebraska Grout Study. The study established that the then-current well construction standards left a preferential pathway for potential contaminates to reach the groundwater sourced for use. The study further established new best standards for grout placement in newly constructed wells in order to seal this preferential pathway. These new standards were adopted and placed into effect by the State of Nebraska in 2014, but they do not apply to previously constructed wells—and therein lies Wauneta’s problem.

Contaminates reach drinking water via water wells and are affected by three basic areas: well construction, geology, and water chemistry. Basically, wells are constructed by utilizing various drilling techniques to drill a borehole.

In the case of small towns in Nebraska, this borehole is typically 32 to 36 inches across. Once the hole has been drilled to the desired depth, which would be to a water source in the ground, a screened section on the end of a pipe is placed in the hole. The screen and the casing (the pipe) vary in diameter but are typically 8 to 24 inches across. The Municipal Water Leader

placement of the casing in the borehole results in a donutshaped space between the casing and the borehole wall.

This is called the well annulus. Under the old standard, this annulus was filled with various materials, from native dirt to sand and gravel. Since the 1970s, sand and gravel have been the predominant fill material.

Nebraska’s geology varies from the sand and sandstones of the Ogallala formation in the West to alluvial sands, gravels, and Dakota sandstones interspersed with clays in the east. Geology in this case can be described as a slice of lasagna with the noodles representing clays and shale deposits, meat being sands and gravels, and the sauce being water-bearing units.

Water chemistry has numerous characteristics, such as temperature, pH, and ORP [oxidation‑reduction potential], to name a few, that have effects on groundwater’s ability to react with other minerals in the soil. Water chemistry can vary at the different levels in the soil.

To understand our fix to the problem, you must understand how well construction, geology, and water chemistry are interrelated. Wells typically are drilled through geological layers with potentially different water chemistry characteristics, which comingle via the preferential pathway created by a nonsealed annulus. This comingling of water may in itself carry contaminated water into clean water zones. Comingling of the water may also change the water’s chemical properties, allowing for unwanted chemical reactions and thereby adversely affecting water quality.

This comingling is driven by the fluid dynamics in a pumping well. When a well is turned on, a cone of depression forms in the water bearing units, similar to the way a vortex forms in a bathtub when you open the drain.

This cone of depression draws water from various upper units into the lower desirable unit via the preferential pathway formed by the annulus. Not only does this cone of depression draw water down the pumping well’s annulus, but it will also draw water down the annulus of improperly abandoned and nonpumping wells within the pumping well’s radius of influence. For a great depiction of this, go to Nebraska Department of Health and Human Services Water Well Standards website and watch the well model video.

Now that you have a basic understanding of the moving parts involved in the problem, here’s the fix: Place a grout seal in the annulus to prevent the comingling of desirable and undesirable water. To get to that point, we must establish the geology, define the water characteristics in that geology, and isolate them via a strategically placed seal or seals.

To establish the type of geology, a test hole is drilled, and drill cuttings are collected. Then the borehole is electrically logged, or e-logged, for natural gamma radiation, normal resistivity, spontaneous potential, and single-point resistance.

Our geologist analyzes the drill cuttings and e-log curves and derives the recipe for the lasagna.

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Bo Bonn and Greg Phillips drilling and collecting geophysical data.

Once the lasagna is described, monitoring wells are drilled with screens placed in the various water-bearing units. These monitoring wells help define confined, as opposed to nonconfined, units. These wells also serve as conduits to collect the water chemistry of the various water-bearing units. The geology, water chemistry, and well logs of the target well and nearby wells are all reviewed in an attempt to describe how water is moving among and between wells and water bearing units. The preferential pathways are identified where they cross clay layers that act as aquitards or aquicludes for the seal location in the target well. The existing casing is perforated and grout is placed in the annulus via the perforations to seal the preferential pathway. Great care must be taken in the proper construction of the monitoring wells and the proper abandonment of the test hole to prevent any further crosscontamination between the units.

So, to answer your original question: Wauneta’s problem is largely due to the construction of its wells. While the wells were constructed using the best standards of the day, those standards are no longer good enough.

We have completed the e-logging and are in the middle of completing our water chemistry profile. Once that is complete, we hope to identify the strategic preferential pathways and place grout seals accordingly.

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Kris Polly: Is it possible to fix those wells?

Bo Bonn: Yes, it is looking that way. It is still a little early to draw a conclusion, but the preliminary data look promising.

Kris Polly: Have you done this on other wells in other locations? Has it been successful?

Bo Bonn: Early results say yes. We are currently working with the State of Nebraska, which is researching the method as well as the success rate. I believe we have been successful.

Our partner in this project, Clean Well Technologies, did this in Cedar Bluffs, Nebraska.

Bill Christopherson: In Cedar Bluffs, there was an irrigation well that was 214‑feet deep with about a 100-foot water level. The nitrate levels measured 17 to 18 parts per million. The maximum contaminant level (MCL) is 10 parts per million. We went down in that well and sealed the aquitards and the nitrates dropped to a nondetectable level.

Wauneta has a different issue: It has arsenic coming from natural sources, but the goal is the same: to block the preferential pathway that the contaminants are using. We started doing this in 2013. It is a very new process. We have learned so much in the last two years. Of the four projects we have worked on with the State thus far, we have lowered the targeted contaminant beneath the MCL in three locations. These results are early and still being studied, but they are promising.

Kris Polly: What is the time frame for completing the project in Wauneta?

Bill Christopherson: We are working with the State and with Wauneta, so research takes a little longer. We should have preliminary results in 4 to 6 months.

Kris Polly: How does your well technology compare to other solutions out there?

Bo Bonn: There is a huge difference between this technology and others being employed. The Wauneta City Council is currently debating this issue. Wauneta has about 300 service connections in its water system, half of which are linked to retired and elderly couples on fixed incomes.

A cost assessment must be considered when selecting a method to fix the problem. Alternative methods include abandoning the affected wells, drilling new wells fields someplace else where presumably the water has not been affected, or treating the existing water in the wells. If you were to opt to treat the water in the wells, you would potentially have to spend $2 million to $5 million to build the water treatment facility. Those funds do not include the year-to-year operating expenses.

In a community as small as Wauneta, it is cost prohibitive to undertake such an operation. We can leave those contaminants in the soil where they belong for only a fraction of the cost. I estimate that it would cost about a couple hundred thousand dollars to fix Wauneta’s existing wells compared with $5 million to put in a water treatment plant. We certainly can’t put a value on people’s health, but we can fix the problem in a smart way with far fewer dollars expended.

Kris Polly: Has the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) recognized your technology as a way to achieve water quality compliance?

Bo Bonn: Although EPA sets the MCLs, in Nebraska well standards are established by the State. The State of Nebraska, has truly established itself as a world leader in defining proper annular grouting techniques. The Nebraska Grout Study established the durability and types of grouts that effectively create annular seals. I think that issue is settled. The issue is whether you can place these grout materials in existing wells with the same effect on the preferential pathway as placement during new construction.

Are the wells constructed under the old standard better with a preferential pathway left open in the annulus or with a properly placed grout in the annulus? I would argue the latter.

Monitoring wells in Wauneta, Nebraska.

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To learn more about this project, please contact Bo Bonn, GeoSpec Drilling, LLC, at (402) 968‑4877 or bobonn43@hotmail.com or Bill Christopherson, Clean Well Technology, at Bill@CleanWellTechnology.com.

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CLASSIFIED LISTINGS

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Location: Oklahoma City, Oklahoma Freese and Nichols’ Oklahoma City office is currently searching for an experienced water/ wastewater engineer to lead teams on municipal utility infrastructure projects. Since opening our office in Oklahoma City in 2014, we have secured numerous projects and are continuing to build our client base. This position presents an opportunity to join our team of highly qualified technical experts and assist in the building of a strong regional presence for the firm.

Project management experience should include: · Client contact responsibilities · Project execution · Agency coordination · Proposal preparation · Project scheduling

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