Municipal Water Leader October 2021 by Water Strategies

Volume 8 Issue 9

October 2021

Jenna Covington: Future Planning at the North Texas Municipal Water District

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STAFF: Kris Polly, Editor-in-Chief Joshua Dill, Managing Editor Tyler Young, Writer Stephanie Biddle, Graphic Designer Eliza Moreno, Web Designer Caroline Polly, Production Assistant and Social Media Coordinator Tom Wacker, Advertising Coordinator Cassandra Leonard, Staff Assistant Milo Schmitt, Media Intern

Jenna Covington: Future Planning at the North Texas Municipal Water District

Contents

October 2021 Volume 8, Issue 9 5 A New Leader for North Texas By Kris Polly

18 J ames Dunning: Synergizing Innovation in the Water Sector at Syrinix

8 Jenna Covington: Future Planning at the North Texas Municipal Water District

22 J onathan Grant: Striking a Better Balance for Wastewater at SENTRY 30 H ealing Waters International: Addressing the Water Crisis Around the World 39 JOB LISTINGS

ADVERTISING: Municipal Water Leader accepts half-page and full-page ads. For more information on rates and placement, please contact Kris Polly at (703) 517-3962 or kris.polly@waterstrategies.com or Tom Wacker at tom.wacker@waterstrategies.com. CIRCULATION: Municipal Water Leader is distributed to all drinking water and wastewater entities with annual budgets or sales of $10 million per year or greater as well as to members of Congress and committee staff and advertising sponsors. For address corrections or additions, or if you would prefer to receive Municipal Water Leader in electronic form, please contact us at admin@waterstrategies.com. Copyright © 2021 Water Strategies LLC. Municipal Water Leader relies on the excellent contributions of a variety of natural resources 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 magazine, 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. @MuniWaterLeader

Coming soon in Municipal Water Leader: November/December: Adel Hagekhalil, General Manager, Metropolitan Water District of Southern California Do you have a story idea for an upcoming issue? Contact our editor-in-chief, Kris Polly, at kris.polly@waterstrategies.com.

4 | MUNICIPAL WATER LEADER | October 2021

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COVER PHOTO:

Jenna Covington, Executive Director and General Manager, North Texas Municipal Water District. Image courtesy of the North Texas Municipal Water District.

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PHOTO COURTESY OF NORTH TEXAS MUNICIPAL WATER DISTRICT.

14 T he California-Nevada Section of the American Water Works Association: Education and Advocacy for the Water Industry

SUBMISSIONS: Municipal Water Leader welcomes manuscript, photography, and art submissions; the right to edit or deny publishing submissions is reserved. Submissions are returned only upon request. For more information, please contact our office at (202) 698-0690 or municipal.water.leader@waterstrategies.com.

A New Leader for North Texas

ur cover interview this month is with Jenna Covington, the new executive director and general manager of the North Texas Municipal Water District (NTMWD), which provides water, wastewater, and solid waste disposal services to 1.8 million people in a rapidly growing area of Texas north of the Dallas–Fort Worth metroplex. Ms. Covington tells us about NTMWD’s current initiatives, including progress on the first new major reservoir in Texas in 30 years, Bois d’Arc Lake. Sue Mosburg is the executive director of the California-Nevada Section of the American Water Works Association, one of the organization’s 43 constituent sections. She tells us about how the section works to solve water problems for utilities and water organizations in a region that struggles with droughts, water affordability, and wildfires. Syrinix provides hardware and data and advisory services to municipal utilities to help them monitor their systems and detect and locate leaks. Chief Executive James Dunning tells us about the company’s products and services. Jonathan Grant of SENTRY tells us about his company’s new bioelectrode sensor for wastewater

By Kris Polly

treatment plants, which is specially designed to thrive in environments with high levels of biofouling. Healing Waters International is a nongovernmental organization working to bring affordable, sustainable potable water infrastructure to remote areas in underdeveloped communities around the world. CEO Rob Anthony and Director of Field Operations and Lead Engineer Walter Nonemaker tell us about the organization’s important work. Municipal Water professionals are working to make the future better than the past, whether they are working to enable northern Texas’s economic dynamism; to fight drought in California; or to provide much-needed, lifegiving water to locations in Haiti or Guatemala. I hope you find their stories in this issue of Municipal Water Leader interesting and inspiring. M Kris Polly is the editor-in-chief of Municipal Water Leader magazine and the president and CEO of Water Strategies LLC, a government relations firm 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 can be contacted at kris.polly@waterstrategies.com.

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Jenna Covington: Future Planning at the North Texas Municipal Water District Municipal Water Leader: Please tell us about NTMWD.

The dam at Bois d’Arc Lake, pictured here in June 2021.

he North Texas Municipal Water District (NTMWD) provides water, wastewater, and solid waste disposal services to 1.8 million people in a rapidly growing area of Texas north of the Dallas–Fort Worth metroplex. To serve this population through the year 2040, NTMWD is building the first new major reservoir in Texas in 30 years, Bois d’Arc Lake. Jenna Covington has recently risen to head the NTMWD as its new executive director and general manager. In this interview, she tells us about progress on Bois d’Arc Lake, NTMWD’s plans to secure water supplies through 2080, and the district’s experience of the February 2021 Winter Storm Uri. Municipal Water Leader: Please tell us about your background and how you came to be in your current position.

8 | MUNICIPAL WATER LEADER | October 2021

Municipal Water Leader: Please tell us about current progress on the Bois d’Arc Lake reservoir. municipalwaterleader.com

PHOTOS COURTESY OF NTMWD.

Jenna Covington: My education and career have been dedicated to working in the water industry. It’s been a wonderfully rewarding industry to work in because we provide life-sustaining services to our communities. I received bachelor’s and master’s degrees in environmental engineering from Texas Tech University. Upon graduation, I spent a number of years working for a global engineering consulting firm, where I provided assistance to water utilities across northern Texas. A little over 6 years ago, I joined the staff of NTMWD to oversee our wastewater operations function. That was a really rewarding experience. I’m now transitioning into the role of executive director and general manager of the district. I am truly honored, humbled, and excited to serve in this new capacity.

Jenna Covington: We provide essential water, wastewater, and solid waste disposal services to around 1.8 million people across 10 counties in northern Texas. Water service is how we started: We began providing wholesale water services to communities around 1956. As these communities have grown in population, so has the scope and complexity of the system we use to meet their needs. Today, we provide wholesale treated water to about 80 communities. To do that, we treat an average of 370 million gallons per day (MGD) of raw water supplies at 6 water treatment plants with a total capacity of over 876 MGD. That treated water is then transferred to 77 delivery points in over 600 miles of transmission pipeline. In response to requests from the cities that we serve, we began providing wastewater services in 1972. This allowed the consolidation of smaller municipal wastewater treatment plants into a regional system, reducing the costs to the cities and streamlining operations. Today, the effective treatment and purification of wastewater is a key way in which we’re helping to meet the future water needs of the region. We provide wastewater services through 13 wastewater treatment plants with a combined capacity of over 163 MGD. We also have 10 interceptor systems, totaling over 226 miles of large-diameter pipeline, that collect wastewater from the communities we serve and transfer it to those treatment plants. The concept of regionalization of services proved to be effective, and in 1979, at the request of our cities, we expanded into solid waste services. When we did that, we agreed that the cities would continue to collect the solid waste from their residents and would deliver it to one of our three transfer stations or to our landfill, which is located in Melissa, Texas. Our staff transports the waste from the transfer stations to our landfill. The landfill accepts, on average, over 1 million tons of solid waste per year.

ADVERTISEMENT Jenna Covington: Bois d’Arc Lake is a really exciting project. There’s a lot of excitement within our service area and also in the area in which the reservoir is located. Bois d’Arc Lake is the first major water reservoir in Texas to be built in nearly 30 years. Getting to this point in the project has taken over 20 years. The 16,641‑acre lake will be located northeast of the city of Bonham in Fannin County. The lake’s name honors local history, since the bois d’arc tree is a symbol of the region. Bois d’Arc Lake will meet the water needs and demands of our growing region until 2040. We are thankful to have received low-interest loans through Construction on an intake tower at Bois d’Arc Lake in June 2021. the Texas Water Development Board (TWDB) to pay for nearly all the projects, That reinforces the need to partner with other agencies to which will save the district and the cities reduce costs. As we look to the future, we’ll be looking to that we serve millions of dollars in financing costs. build on existing partnerships with peer utilities to meet We reached a major milestone when we began the needs not only of our service area but of the metroplex impounding water on April 14, 2021. How long the lake as a whole. Additionally, conservation continues to be a will take to fill depends on rainfall in the watershed. At the key aspect of our future water supply planning, and we dam site, construction crews are still topping off the dam continually explore opportunities to educate our customers embankment and finishing the construction of the weir, the and encourage water conservation. spillway, and the raw water pump station. Other work at the lake includes completing the lake administration offices and Municipal Water Leader: Are there any other infrastructure the three public boat ramps that are included in the project. projects that you are working on? We are in the process of testing the recently completed 35‑mile, 90‑inch pipeline that will deliver raw water from Jenna Covington: The growth in this region is the primary Bois d’Arc Lake to the new water treatment plant located driver for much of our capital improvement program. near Leonard, Texas. The 84‑inch treated water pipeline is One recent project is the recently completed Trinity River progressing too, with over 5½ of its 25 miles having been main stem pump station and pipeline. We are leaders in installed already. We are planning for the lake and the water reuse, and this project will allow us to fully use our associated water treatment and transmission system to be East Fork water reuse project, also known as the wetlands, operational by summer 2022. which covers 1,840 acres and provides natural filtration for an average of 90 MGD of water, which we then pump Municipal Water Leader: You mentioned that this reservoir through a 42‑mile, 84‑inch pipeline back to Lavon Lake, is supposed to fulfill your needs until the year 2040. Does where it is blended and stored until it undergoes treatment that mean that you will have to start looking at a new at the Wylie water treatment plant for distribution as reservoir before that year? drinking water. The construction of the main stem pump station was made possible by our partnership with the Jenna Covington: Yes. One of the things that we’re currently Trinity River Authority, from which we purchase effluent working on is our long-range water supply planning effort. flows. The project consists of an intake and pump station This will help us identify and evaluate potential raw water that includes four 1,500‑horsepower pumps and 17 miles supply sources for NTMWD through 2080, develop of 72‑inch‑diameter pipeline. This project is a great prioritized sets of actions needed to pursue the projects that example of how water reuse is critical to providing critical are selected through that evaluation, and update our capital services to our growing region. improvement program to meet those needs. Another infrastructure project is our Sister Grove regional Municipal Water Leader: Would you tell us more about your water resource recovery facility, which is intended to address the growth in our service area on the wastewater side. It is long-range water supply effort? projected to come online in 2023 at 16 MGD and to be expanded by an additional 16 MGD in 2025. The plant itself Jenna Covington: The future supplies that we’re looking at is estimated to cost $546 million, and it will take an additional are much farther from the Dallas–Fort Worth metroplex. municipalwaterleader.com

October 2021 | MUNICIPAL WATER LEADER

ADVERTISEMENT $118 million to construct the conveyance infrastructure to get the wastewater to the plant. Thankfully, we were able to partner with the TWDB for the financing of the plant. Because of that, we expect to save over $160 million in interest costs over the 30‑year period of the bonds. Looking more broadly, we currently have 62 projects with a value of over $1 million each across all our service areas. The combined construction costs of these projects amount to $2.245 billion. We have a thriving economy in our 2,200‑square-mile service area, and lots of people are deciding that this is a great place to live. It’s imperative that we have infrastructure in place to handle the growth that we’re experiencing now and that we expect to experience in the future. Additionally, we have aging infrastructure across all our services whose reliability we need to ensure for decades to come. We will continue to monitor and improve that infrastructure.

the other for wastewater operators (comprising four 20‑hour classes). After completing the training and attaining a license, participants had the opportunity to apply for a 5‑week paid internship at the district. On the wastewater side of things, 15 of the 36 students who took the classes obtained their class D licenses, 8 of them interned at NTMWD, we hired 3, and 1 went to work at another municipality. That effort has resulted in at least four individuals choosing a career in water. The people who go through the program don’t have to come to work for us; they will be extremely valuable to any water sector employer. On the water side of things, we completed our first round of classes in March 2021. We had 33 students start the course, 21 complete all the courses offered, 14 apply to take the exam to become licensed, and 10 be approved for the exam. We’re optimistic that more will continue to obtain employment and licenses through this program.

Municipal Water Leader: Would you tell us about the district’s experience during the February winter storm?

Municipal Water Leader: Would you tell us about the district’s efforts to ensure that its systems are working in an environmentally friendly manner?

Jenna Covington: Our dedicated team of professionals pulled together and worked to maintain essential services during that winter storm. The NTMWD employees who are responsible for providing safe, reliable drinking water; wastewater treatment; and solid waste disposal worked long hours to make sure the operational challenges could be overcome, and we continued to provide service throughout the event. Facing numerous challenges, our employees persevered with courage and put service before self. Crews did the same by working under extreme conditions to solve problems caused by frozen pipes and equipment and to ensure the delivery of fuel to emergency generators at water and wastewater pump stations, lift stations, and plants. Our laboratory personnel maintained testing operations to ensure that safe, clean, treated drinking water was being delivered to members and customers. NTMWD executives and supervisors kept in close contact with officials and communities that are served by the district and with our energy providers. Some employees were working double shifts and others were sleeping on cots in the control room and other facilities to be on site and available to quickly respond to operational issues. Personnel were working outside their regular job duties and jumping in to assist where they could. Municipal Water Leader: Would you tell us about your Waterworks training program and why you decided to develop it?

10 | MUNICIPAL WATER LEADER | October 2021

Municipal Water Leader: Would you tell us about your vision for the future of the district? Jenna Covington: My vision for the future of NTMWD is to live out our vision statement: regional service through unity, meeting our region’s needs today and tomorrow. I will lead us in this direction by acting as a collaborative leader who brings people together to provide excellent service. The critical services we provide are essential to the high standard of living that we’ve become accustomed to. Our staff, our board, our members, our customers, and our critical partners will work together to provide dependable, highquality services to the 1.8 million residents of today and the 3.7 million residents of tomorrow. M Jenna Covington is the executive director and general manager of the North Texas Municipal Water District. She can be contacted at executivedirector.info@ntmwd.com. municipalwaterleader.com

PHOTO COURTESY OF NTMWD.

Jenna Covington: The district created the Waterworks training program in collaboration with Collin College, with the aid of a state-funded grant, to address the growing shortage of workers in the water and wastewater treatment industries. The Waterworks training program consists of two training paths, each aimed at gaining a class D license: one for water operators (comprising two 20‑hour classes and one 24‑hour class) and

Jenna Covington: We must adhere to stringent federal and state regulatory standards in our operations and facilities in our service areas of water, wastewater, and solid waste. We consistently meet or surpass the guidelines set by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality (TCEQ). In addition, NTMWD’s environmental laboratory analyzes water and wastewater samples to ensure they meet drinking water regulations and other water quality criteria. The laboratory itself is accredited by the TCEQ for potable and nonpotable parameters and conducts over 200,000 tests per year.

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The California-Nevada Section of the American Water Works Association: Education and Advocacy for the Water Industry

The CA-NV AWWA headquarters, located inside the Frontier Project in Rancho Cucamonga, California.

he American Water Works Association (AWWA) provides advocacy, education, and tools to support new and experienced managers in the water industry. The California-Nevada Section of AWWA (CA-NV AWWA), one of AWWA’s 43 constituent sections, works to solve water problems for utilities and water organizations in a region that struggles with droughts, water affordability, and wildfires. In this interview, Sue Mosburg, the executive director of CA-NV AWWA, tells us about her organization’s efforts to support the water industry through trying times.

Municipal Water Leader: Please tell us about CA-NV AWWA.

Municipal Water Leader: Please tell us about your background and how you came to be in your current position.

Municipal Water Leader: Is AWWA made up of different regional sections like yours?

Sue Mosburg: I started working in water when I was a senior in high school. My first job was as a lake ranger’s assistant at the City of San Diego’s drinking water reservoirs. I enjoyed that job for 9 years before going to work for San Diego’s safety training program. I then worked for a drinking water system in the San Diego region. I became involved with AWWA at the local level when operator certification programs became a new requirement in the 1990s. I became an active leader in AWWA and moved up through the volunteer structure. About a year and a half ago, CA-NV AWWA was looking for an executive director. I was ready to retire from public agency service at the water system, but not ready to leave the industry. I applied for the position and got it. I started in the executive director role in January 2020.

Sue Mosburg: AWWA is made up of 43 different sections based in Canada, the United States, Mexico, and Puerto Rico. AWWA also has members across the globe, including, for example, a large number of members in Japan, and has some satellite organizations, such as India AWWA. AWWA has about 50,000 members. CA-NV AWWA represents 10 percent of the total membership. Each section works independently to put on educational courses and networking activities and to support the local needs of its membership. The association’s headquarters tends to focus more on the overarching elements. The association has manuals of practice and technical committees that deal with topics that affect the entire membership and focuses on advocacy at the national U.S. level. If there are regional issues, municipalwaterleader.com

PHOTO COURTESY OF CA-NV AWWA.

14 | MUNICIPAL WATER LEADER | October 2021

Sue Mosburg: AWWA, our parent organization, is the largest nonprofit scientific and educational association in the world. CA-NV AWWA is also a nonprofit association. Our mission mirrors AWWA’s: We support water professionals and provide training services and certification activities. We celebrated our 100th anniversary last year. We provide the services network needed to bring the local drinking water community together. Our focus is on education, knowledge transfer, and advocacy.

ADVERTISEMENT such as water supply issues in California that have to do with the state’s unique blend of wholesalers and retailers, they will be dealt with by a local section. The local section will interact with state regulators and advocate on state issues. Municipal Water Leader: Who are AWWA’s members? Sue Mosburg: Individuals and organizations. Our organizational members include water and wastewater systems, utilities, manufacturers, service providers, and consulting firms. Many individuals at member organizations also hold their own individual memberships. They include engineers, water system operators, managers, scientists, environmentalists, and academics. Our membership includes both the regulated and the regulators. Most stakeholder groups are represented in our membership, including customers. CA-NV AWWA’s membership unites and educates the larger community of water utilities, engineers, water system operators and managers, scientists, environmentalists, consultants, manufacturers, commercial businesses, academics, regulators, and others who provide safe and reliable water in a manner that ensures public health while also providing safe and sufficient water for all. Municipal Water Leader: What does it mean for AWWA to be a standard-setting organization? Sue Mosburg: AWWA started publishing what we call consensus documents around 1908. Today, there are more than 180 officially documented AWWA standards, addressing all facets of water supply, treatment, delivery, distribution, operational issues, and management. Those documents reflect the state of the industry and set the best practices and standards with which many organizations comply. They are created through a formal standard-setting process. The AWWA standards council is accredited by the American National Standards Institute (ANSI), and it follows ANSI methodology to vet stakeholders and put together a group of stakeholders that represent the totality of the industry. At this point in time, over 1,600 volunteers serve as subject-matter experts for the AWWA standards council. The standards that AWWA pushes out don’t take precedence over applicable laws, regulations, or government codes. They are intended to represent the industry’s consensus of satisfactory service, and in some cases, to benchmark the industry’s best practices. AWWA is seen as an authoritative technical resource, but that is because it draws from all those voices. At the section level, our standards are a little less formal, although we also rely on subject-matter experts to vet our programs. Although CA-NV AWWA doesn’t adhere to the full complexity of ANSI standards, we adhere to their intent and still try to get stakeholder knowledge. We have several disciplines in our certification program, including backflow and cross-connection control, advanced water treatment, and municipalwaterleader.com

water use efficiency. We brought stakeholder groups together to develop all those programs and to maintain them following best-in-practice accreditation standards. We are moving toward being an ANSI-authorized provider of certification programs. The process we’ve used so far has brought us to the point where it’s time to step over that formal line. Similarly, our education program has been accredited by the International Accreditors for Continuing Education and Training (IACET), benchmarking the section as a provider of high-quality instruction. Municipal Water Leader: Please tell us about your water utility council. Sue Mosburg: Our water utility council is relatively new. We’ve had a government affairs council at the section level for a number of years, but we got to the point at which we realized that we needed to be a greater advocate for water utilities, and we decided to elevate our voice by forming the water utility council. It is a technical group that has been appointed to represent the broad spectrum of water systems within our section’s membership in terms of size, location, type of utility, and services offered. Our water utility council represents agencies from Northern California, Southern California, central California, and Nevada. It has two subgroups; one focuses on legislative issues and the other on regulatory issues. The council takes a look at proposals at the regulatory and legislative levels and makes sure they are aligned with technical realities. For example, if the devices to measure a certain constituent in the water only measure accurately down to a certain quantity, it’s hard to set a rule that requires the levels of that constituent to be any lower. If you can’t measure it, you can’t follow the rule. Our water utility council advocates for balanced, appropriate regulations and legislation based on the reality in the field. That mirrors what’s happening at the central AWWA water utility council, which has existed for a number of years and does the same thing on a national level with U.S. federal regulation. Municipal Water Leader: What are the top issues CA-NV AWWA is addressing? Sue Mosburg: In 2020, our section’s voice influenced several California legislative and regulatory questions. One specific area we dealt with was transparency for water quality response notification levels. We got involved with the revised standards for the California Environmental Lab Accreditation Program and have been involved in economic feasibility work related to safe drinking water standards and nonpoint source protection program implementation. We’ve also been heavily involved in the performance standards for water loss control for distribution systems and water efficiency. When the pandemic hit, we supported the shift to online certification examinations instead of in-person exams for distribution and treatment system October 2021 | MUNICIPAL WATER LEADER

| 15

ADVERTISEMENT operators so that operator certification could continue. Most recently, we’ve been involved with the comprehensive overhaul of California’s rules for backflow prevention and cross-connection control programs. Historically, we have focused on operator-centered, distribution- and treatmentrelated, and water-quality-related issues. Over the last few years, we’ve expanded our involvement in issues related to water efficiency, water loss, environmental concerns, and disadvantaged communities. Municipal Water Leader: What are your educational and training activities on the section level, and who are the main audiences for them? Sue Mosburg: Our primary education and training audience is made up of the newer system distribution and treatment operators who are progressing in their professional careers. They come to our classes either to prepare for higher-level certifications or to receive ongoing education credit and stay abreast of new regulations. We also provide initial and refresher backflow-prevention and cross-connection-control training for those who seek certification in these disciplines. As a result of the COVID‑19 pandemic, we learned that we needed to bolster our online learning opportunities. With the wildfires in the state, drought issues, and affordability issues, we had to expand our educational offerings. Now, we have on-demand content and an online training program called H2OKnow that is available 24/7. Many of the certified water operators use it for their ongoing education. We also continue to do individualized web-based classroom training and in-person training for backflow specialists. We have IACET-accredited coursework approved for those who are aiming to become certified operators and need specialized training to meet their certification requirements. Our classes in distribution-treatment operations and math make up the core of what we do, but we complement that with emergency response training and specialized topics. Over the last 5 years, recognizing workforce issues, we’ve started to reach out to students, encouraging them to consider a job in water when they’re young and still thinking about what they want to do. We have local AWWA student chapters, including seven in the California-Nevada region. Through those chapters, we’re linking industry professionals with university students to talk about careers in the industry, providing them with plant tours, and establishing personal connections to managers so that they can understand the industry and how exciting it might be for them.

Municipal Water Leader: What is your vision for the future? Sue Mosburg: Safe, reliable water for all. That vision is achievable through collaboration. I see a future in which CA-NV AWWA creates meaningful and functional opportunities for all our members to contribute to the water community, including those who are new. I see a future in which we create opportunities for that dialogue and contribution across the industry and across the water community. I see a future in which CA-NV AWWA delivers sound, relevant, and innovative education and certification programs to prepare those who are coming into the industry for future opportunities. I see AWWA promoting the vital place of water in public health and the environment to the larger community. We tend to focus on our piece of the industry and forget how it fits into the larger picture of the health and well-being of the entire community. I want to do that better by educating those who are on the fringes of our communities and elevating the public’s trust in the services we provide. After working for a government agency for several decades, I know that there is a level of distrust. I strongly believe that in the United States, specifically in the urban areas of California and Nevada, our water systems are robust. They provide goodquality water, and we need to continue to urge the public to trust, believe, and pay appropriately for that service. M Sue Mosburg is the executive director of California-Nevada AWWA. She can be contacted at smosburg@ca-nv-awwa.org.

Sue Mosburg: The biggest issue we’re spending time on right now is water affordability. After COVID‑19 hit

16 | MUNICIPAL WATER LEADER | October 2021

municipalwaterleader.com

PHOTO COURTESY OF CA-NV AWWA.

Municipal Water Leader: Are there any other top issues that AWWA is working on?

California, water agencies found they were no longer able to shut off customers for nonpayment of water bills. That caused some arrearages, which we are helping water systems work through. It’s important that water systems have tools that support customers and encourage them to make timely payments. Many water systems are struggling to find equitable solutions to keep the water flowing at an affordable price. There are many new water quality regulations and regulations that require upgrades to treatment plans. Affordability will affect many of us in what we do, how we do it, and where our industry goes. Another issue that is becoming an area of focus is water supply availability. That’s a given in California and Nevada, where we always have cycles of shortage. As we move forward, especially with climate change, supply availability will be an even greater issue. So will source water protection, including dealing with microplastics, per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS), and perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA). Ten years ago, those weren’t on our radar, but they are now, and they’re issues that we’re tackling with individual struggling agencies.

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James Dunning: Synergizing Innovation in the Water Sector at Syrinix

ringing innovation to mature water infrastructure systems can be a significant challenge. New regulatory, environmental, and market factors all constrain the ability of water users to institute better and more effective management strategies. Syrinix is a company working to help them by providing products and technologies that can simultaneously address many different water management issues, including leak detection and pressure monitoring. In this interview, Syrinix’s chief executive, James Dunning, tells Municipal Water Leader about the company’s history and how its new products are addressing present and future water challenges. Municipal Water Leader: Please tell us about your background and how you came to be in your current position. James Dunning: I started off as a lawyer, moving in house quite early Syrinix’s PipeMinder-One Acoustic sensor, which combines leak detection and in my career, but I quickly found I high-resolution pressure monitoring into a single unit. preferred being the lead on a project to being the advisor, and I moved to more First, utilities don’t go to the market looking for a shiny commercial roles. I started in the utility box; they are looking for the solution to a problem. From a sector, working for a large electricity company, but when strategic point of view, there are also a lot of big beasts in the that company was taken over, I decided to go down a more water sector supply chain that are good at providing costentrepreneurial road, first in the renewable sector and then optimized solutions, so we knew we needed to be customer in the water sector. When I joined Syrinix, the company focused and go the extra mile to help support utilities. provided hardware solutions, but it was also a brand with a product that delivered solutions to clients in an exciting Municipal Water Leader: How large is Syrinix? sector with real challenges. I’ve been with the company for 10 years, and I’m still loving it. James Dunning: We have 24 employees. Our base is in Today, I’m the chief executive, and I run the company on the UK, and we also have an office in Henderson, Nevada, a day-to-day basis. A number of high-net-worth investors, just outside Las Vegas. We’re finding that the U.S. market known as angel investors, own the company. I deliberately in particular is really gearing up for innovation; it is try to run the company on a flat basis. Unless I create an an important market for us. I think this was probably environment where everyone feels comfortable putting accelerated by the COVID‑19 pandemic. Alongside forward a view and arguing their position, the system won’t revenue and climate change challenges, the age and work and the company will not succeed. state of infrastructure in the United States is now being Municipal Water Leader: Please tell us about the history of Syrinix. acknowledged as a real problem.

18 | MUNICIPAL WATER LEADER | October 2021

Municipal Water Leader: Is Syrinix still primarily oriented toward hardware? James Dunning: Today, there are three aspects to our business, the first of which is hardware. Hardware is central municipalwaterleader.com

PHOTOS COURTESY OF SYRINIX.

James Dunning: It started as a project between the University of East Anglia and Thames Water, and it initially retained a heavy research bias. When I joined, the company was heavily hardware oriented, but it has since pivoted toward a much more solution-focused approach. We pivoted for two reasons.

ADVERTISEMENT to our business for two reasons. First, from a competitive point of view, if your hardware is attached to a pipe, no one else’s can be attached to that pipe, or in any case it is much less likely. Our hardware also guarantees the quality of our data. However, what differentiates us are the other two elements of our business: data and advisory services. The way we present data to the user, providing automated filtering and configurable alarms, is important. We also make it easy to manage your units remotely, to move from unit to unit, to integrate our system with a SCADA system, and to import SCADA data into our system. We also provide additional advisory services to ensure that customers can focus on decisionmaking rather than data gathering.

if a problem has occurred, rather than doing too much proactively. Our solutions can be deployed easily in all those systems, with users able to view units and configure alerting remotely as well. It’s all automated.

Municipal Water Leader: Please tell us about some of your products.

Municipal Water Leader: Do you market your products outside the UK and the United States?

James Dunning: Our business has always had two main areas. One is high-resolution precision leak detection. Our units are installed on a pipeline, which they automatically check every day. They filter out lots of extraneous noise from construction, planes, trains, and people and tell you precisely where there is a leak. That has been a successful part of our business. The other side of our business, which has also been successful, is providing high-resolution pressure data. This is particularly important for the U.S. market, because sending regular pressure waves through your system can have much more negative effects on older pipes than on newer pipes. Our products provide precise pressure data to utilities that can show them how daily operations might be stressing the network and how to mitigate those stresses. We’re excited about the recent launch of our PipeMinder-One Acoustic, which combines those two areas of expertise into a single solution that covers both leak detection and pressure monitoring. That is cheaper than having two separate solutions. With the single solution, utilities can, first of all, deal with their number 1 priority: noticing leaks when they occur and, in this case, also being told precisely where they are. It is also critical in managing bursts. People refer to the hour after a major burst as the golden hour, and this solution can accelerate responses in that hour by 15–20 percent, since the system tells you where the burst is and which pipe to shut down. In addition to enabling that reactive management, this product also provides highresolution pressure insights that can help explain what is contributing to and causing those leaks and bursts.

James Dunning: Absolutely. The UK and the United States are our key markets, but we also work in Canada and Mexico, and we’ve just appointed a distributor in Chile. We have distribution in Australia and mainland Europe as well. Interestingly, we find that the biggest determinant of success is the external pressure being applied on the utility. For example, 5–6 years ago, California had quite a heavy drought. Suddenly, it needed to change. In the UK, it has happened because of changing regulations. Australia is a leading market just because of the terrific challenges it has with droughts. It will be interesting to see how the sector responds to the pressures created by COVID‑19 and the drought conditions in the United States. During the pandemic, for the first time ever, businesses shut down and everyone stayed at home. That changed the demands on the water network, and while this hasn’t yet been statistically proven, a lot of utilities have commented that leaks and bursts went down. When the field crews started working on the network again, leaks and bursts started to go back up, and when businesses came back online at normal levels, they went up again. This shows that the way a network is used is a contributor to leaks and bursts. We see a big opportunity in partnering with utilities to help them deal with those leaks and bursts, but also to understand what causes them.

Municipal Water Leader: Where in a system are these devices placed? James Dunning: Typically, we see the network split into different levels of criticality. The most important parts of the pipeline network will have permanent monitoring. The next level down will have more dispersed monitoring. For the least critical parts, the utility may just want to know municipalwaterleader.com

Municipal Water Leader: Can a utility install the system by itself? James Dunning: Everything is designed so that the utility can install it itself, though we can also provide in-field support during the initial installation. We actually do presite surveys of the locations where the units are going to be installed to make sure that there is a mobile phone signal and to check whether there are any health and safety concerns.

Municipal Water Leader: What is your vision for the future? James Dunning: I am hugely engaged and energized by the sector and want to continue focusing on Syrinix’s continued growth as a successful company. M James Dunning is the chief executive of Syrinix. He can be reached at james.dunning@syrinix.com.

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Jonathan Grant: Striking a Better Balance for Wastewater at SENTRY

A SENTRY system is installed at Kelso Lake.

aving accurate and consistent data is vital for overcoming the challenges faced by wastewater treatment plants, but most monitoring techniques are either vulnerable to fouling or slow. SENTRY’s new bioelectrode sensor avoids both problems. The product improves the monitoring of microbial balance, toxic shock events, and other factors that impede effective wastewater management. In this interview, Jonathan Grant, SENTRY’s chief commercial officer, tells Municipal Water Leader how the product was developed, the benefits it provides customers, and the effect the technology is having on wastewater management around the world. Municipal Water Leader: Please tell us about your background and how you came to be in your current position. Jonathan Grant: I wound up with SENTRY because I’ve been consulting with and working with startups for the past decade. I’ve been with SENTRY for about a year and a half. My real strength is in helping companies take an interesting technical idea and turning it into a value-driven message that a layman can understand. I consulted for a number of innovative earlystage companies. Before that, I was with a startup artificial intelligence company that was acquired, and prior to that I was at a water technology accelerator called WaterTAP.

Jonathan Grant: All have been water related. At WaterTAP, it was my job to understand who was doing what in the Ontario water sector, and then help them grow globally.

22 | MUNICIPAL WATER LEADER | October 2021

I spent 4–5 years traveling the world, going to every conference, and helping those companies out. That’s how I met Patrick Kiely about 8–9 years ago. Municipal Water Leader: Please tell us about SENTRY. Jonathan Grant: SENTRY started off about 8 years ago as part of Patrick Kiely’s company Island Water Technologies, which he developed to create innovative water technologies. It’s based on his postdoctoral research into microbial fuel cells. The company has about 12 employees and is growing. We have about 80 clients. At this time last year, we had about 25, so it’s been quite a rapid growth. About half are municipalities; the other half are industrial users in the pulp/ paper, food and beverage, and petrochemical industries. In terms of municipalities, we’ve been installed everywhere from a town of 3,000 in Prince Edward Island called Montague all the way up to Chicago’s Metropolitan Water Reclamation District. We’re now on every continent. We’re installed at the Basic Sanitation Company of the State of São Paulo in Brazil; the Singapore Public Utilities Board; the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission; and a number of utilities in the UK, including United Utilities and Wessex Water. Municipal Water Leader: Please tell us about your product. Jonathan Grant: Rather than trying to generate energy from biology, Patrick flipped the concept on its head. What we do is apply a small voltage to a flat surface on which biofilm grows, and as carbon is consumed by the biology growing municipalwaterleader.com

PHOTOS COURTESY OF SENTRY.

Municipal Water Leader: Of your previous ventures, how many were water related?

The SENTRY probe.

ADVERTISEMENT attach to an aeration basin or a primary clarifier. It installs pretty much like a diffused oxygen probe or a pH probe. Municipal Water Leader: Where precisely in a plant should the probe be positioned? Jonathan Grant: The ideal place for our probe is at the front end of a plant, right after a screen, so that it doesn’t get debris on it. The ideal setup is to put one at the front and one at the back of the primary clarifier. That way, users can actually see the shock that hits the system and how much it is going to affect things further down the line with sufficient lead time. It can pretty much be put anywhere, other than a hydraulic dead zone where it’s not going to get any flow over it or directly downstream of ferric dosing, because the chemicals used in that process are metallic and stick to the plates. Municipal Water Leader: You mentioned that your approach flips conventional approaches on their head. Would you expand on what you meant by that? The installation of a SENTRY probe.

on the sensor, it respires electrons. We essentially measure that respiration. If there are a lot of organics, as in a brewery discharge, there’s more carbon to be consumed, and the biofilm respires more. If there’s a toxic shock from chemicals or something like inflow and infiltration, it reduces the available carbon and there will be less respiration. Our device is kind of like a heart rate monitor for your biology’s ability to treat incoming wastewater. The probe is built to live in wastewater, so it can be placed anywhere. We can help at every point in the process, but right now our standard practice is to start at the primary clarifier and then move on to optimize a specific process. The primary clarifier is where 85 percent of our clients start. Clients love to identify and understand what’s coming into their plants while they still have time to act on that information. Our typical deployment is a 6‑month pilot with clear success criteria, so that the end user isn’t putting time and effort into something that won’t lead to value. Upon success, there are two options for expansion: either we can go out into the collection system, find industrial discharges, and put probes there, or we can go into the plant and optimize a process like anaerobic digestion, aeration optimization, or supplemental carbon dosing. Municipal Water Leader: Do you have two types of probe, one that can be installed in a pipe and one that is inserted directly into a body of water? Jonathan Grant: It’s the same probe; where it is placed depends on the location and configuration of the plant. It’s easy to screw into a pipe with 1½‑inch threading or to municipalwaterleader.com

Jonathan Grant: There are two basic ways to get information about wastewater biological conditions. One is with a light-based sensor, which essentially shines a light through a glass plate. Those are effective, but they require a lot of maintenance, because with biofilm growth, they literally get covered in waste. The other approach is just taking samples of the water and getting a lab analysis, which is fine for regulations and for getting specific chemical or species validation but can take up to 5 days. Our sensors are built to work in nasty conditions. The reason they can be placed in so many different parts of the plants is that they’re built to live in places that grow biofilm. Biofouling disrupts every other sensor, but it is actually what makes our sensor work. Municipal Water Leader: What kind of maintenance does your probe require? Jonathan Grant: We ask that people look at the probe once a quarter. If there’s anything on it, such as fats, oils, grease, or rags, it can usually be cleaned by swirling it around in a bucket for a minute and then put right back in. For most folks, the probe requires 4 hours of maintenance a year. Municipal Water Leader: How often does the probe take a reading? Jonathan Grant: Once a minute. The whole system uses less power than a light bulb, so it can run at all times. That gives a good baseline to see any issues that occur. Once a client understands the metric and how to use it, the next question is how to optimize their processes and make better decisions. Municipal Water Leader: Can end users install these probes themselves? October 2021 | MUNICIPAL WATER LEADER

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ADVERTISEMENT waiting. Anaerobic digestion is a key market for us as well, especially with codigestion becoming a more popular way for municipalities to generate energy. Municipal Water Leader: What is your top goal as a company?

A SENTRY technician installs a probe.

Jonathan Grant: We’ve shipped around the world during the COVID‑19 pandemic. Especially in places where we have manufacturer’s reps, we do offer to do the installation, but it wouldn’t be difficult for a municipal operator to install the probe. It usually takes 2–3 hours to install. Municipal Water Leader: Is your primary customer base local, regional, or international? Jonathan Grant: It is truly international. Our best clients are those who have had a local brewery open up or are pulling their hair out because every time it rains they experience effluent issues. We can also serve leading operators anywhere who want to understand and improve their plant. Eventually, we want to become a standard operating tool. Municipal Water Leader: How did you develop this technology?

24 | MUNICIPAL WATER LEADER | October 2021

Municipal Water Leader: How do you plan to make that breakthrough? Jonathan Grant: We’re doing a lot of work with academics, research and development departments at large utilities, and innovation groups. We had a lot of early success and continue to have success with groups like that. We’re still breaking through that wall every day; 80 units is a lot for us, but it’s not a lot in terms of numbers of treatment plants. A number of issues hold true potential for the water community to provide better wastewater treatment, and we’re a small part of that. Municipal Water Leader: What is your vision for the future? Jonathan Grant: Our big, hairy, audacious goal is for SENTRY to be installed in every advanced water and wastewater process in the world by 2040. More immediately, we want to have 400 installations by the end of 2024. We are dreaming big but being practical. Our real vision is to make biological processes intuitive, simple, and controllable. I would suggest reading the book Start With Why by Simon Sinek. Our why as a company is that we care about the environment and making the world better through smarter decisions in treating water and wastewater. I think that’s likely true of almost everyone in the water and wastewater sector: We get up every day and know that we’re making the world a better place. M Jonathan Grant is the chief commercial officer for SENTRY. He can be reached at jgrant@islandwatertech.com.

municipalwaterleader.com

PHOTOS COURTESY OF SENTRY.

Jonathan Grant: Initially, our technology was built to help monitor a package treatment plant that our sister company REGEN had developed. Remote monitoring for that project was important because it was getting shipped out to an extremely remote place, and when I say remote, I mean off grid solar powered. We realized that this was actually a winning device on its own. We tried a couple of things. The first was to ask treatment plant operators where they thought it would be useful. That’s why we have so many different problem statements—we tried it out in lots of places. The funny thing we always joke about is that we first thought that everyone would want to use our probe to monitor their effluent. No one wants that. They want to know what they can do to act on something beforehand instead of finding out that they have an issue at the end. If we had waited for regulation, we’d still be

Jonathan Grant: We’re trying to change the metric that has been used for monitoring for as long as anyone can remember: biological oxygen demand (BOD) or BOD surrogates. We think we have a better metric for real-time process control and reliability, and it is complementary to the existing processes and tools out there. The superiority of our process is like that of e-mail over waiting for something to come in the mail. The difference in terms of real-time understanding between our biological sensor and a lab test for BOD really is that stark. Our biggest challenge is to break through the status quo and ensure that operators understand how to use this information.

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ustin’s Downtown Wastewater Tunnel was con‑ structed to alleviate the stress on two major sewers that were running at capacity. These sewers serve downtown Austin, running along the north and south shores of Lady Bird Lake, a downtown reservoir on the Colorado River used primarily for flood control and recre‑ ation. The added capacity from the new tunnel takes sewer flows from both existing lines to prevent sewer overflow and provides the additional capacity needed for existing and future expansion in the downtown area. Another benefit of the project is that several lift stations were taken offline by the Austin Water Utility, thus improving the effi‑ ciency and reliability of the system. Due to the sewer’s proximity to downtown, the city selected tunneling methods to avoid major public disruption. The five shaft locations were also chosen based on geo‑

technical investigations and to limit the public impact of the project. The project includes over 3.5 miles of gravity tunnel that is 50 to 80 feet deep and crosses under Lady Bird Lake three times, picking up flows from several interceptors. Designed by the Austin office of Parsons, an engineer‑ ing and construction company, the project includes 54‑ to 90‑inch-diameter HOBAS pipe. The design considerations included the varied geologic profile and the crossing of several fault zones, design flows and the maintenance of adequate flow velocity. Since the tunnel passes through populated areas and would be difficult to repair in the fu‑ ture, a long service life was critical and the use of corrosion resistant materials imperative. The designer chose HOBAS pipe due to its corrosion resistance and long life, but the installer enjoyed the quick installation and leak-free service of the couplings.

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Healing Waters International: Addressing the Water Crisis Around the World

ccess to clean, affordable water is a vital precondition for public health and a thriving economy, and its absence is a serious challenge for many communities and countries around the world. Healing Waters International is one of the many organizations taking on the challenge of bringing affordable, sustainable potable water infrastructure to underdeveloped communities across the globe. In this interview, Healing Waters CEO Rob Anthony and Director of Field Operations and Lead Engineer Walter Nonemaker tell Municipal Water Leader about how they are carrying out the organization’s mission. Municipal Water Leader: Please tell us about your backgrounds and how you came to be in your current positions.

Walter Nonemaker: I got excited about international development, community development, and mission work in high school. I started learning Spanish and going on discovery trips to Spanish-speaking countries. I knew that I wanted to do something with my life that would make the world a better place. I decided to study civil and environmental engineering

30 | MUNICIPAL WATER LEADER | October 2021

A rendering of a solar reverse osmosis kiosk, typical of Healing Waters International’s projects in Haiti.

in college, and water emerged as my primary interest. I continued doing international internships, studying abroad, going on discovery trips, and improving my Spanish. When I finished college, I started searching for jobs in this sector and got hired to work in Guatemala as field staff for Healing Waters International. I started out as the Guatemala water treatment technician, and over the years, I was able to grow within the organization to become the Guatemala country director. I eventually relocated back to the United States after living in Guatemala for 9 years and became the director of field operations for Healing Waters International. More recently, my role has expanded to director of field operations and lead engineer. I oversee most of the operational and programmatic components of our work. Municipal Water Leader: Tell us about Healing Waters International as an organization and its history and mission. Rob Anthony: We started in 2002 after a husband-and-wife team went on a mission trip to Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic. They put together a water purification kiosk to sell water in the community at a price that was much more affordable than anything the people in the city had municipalwaterleader.com

PHOTOS COURTESY OF HEALING WATERS INTERNATIONAL.

Rob Anthony: After a successful exit from an engineering and manufacturing company that I started coming out of college, I was a pastor at a church in Oregon. One of the things we were involved in was international mission work, through which we helped communities develop different aspects of their community life. Through my travels, I became cognizant of the magnitude of the global water crisis for the first time in my life. We kept stumbling on this issue, which was holding communities back in terms of both health and economic development. We couldn’t do the work we’d planned to do because of that issue. At the same time, an Oregon technology startup called Puralytics was developing innovative technologies for purifying water that used light and nanotechnology and had low energy needs. It held a lot of promise for helping address water purification problems in the developing world, especially in places that are remote, underserved, and underresourced. I invested in the company, joined its board, and spent about 2½ years traveling throughout Africa, Central America, and Asia, running trials and looking for ways to apply the technology at a large scale. One issue we ran into was that providing safe water that meets drinking standards at an extremely low cost is difficult. I also realized that there was a need for more than just technology—there was a need to bring holistic and economically sustainable solutions that build local capacity, knowledge, and community engagement. That’s when I came across Healing Waters International through some relationships that I had. I was invited to come on board here about 5 years ago.

ADVERTISEMENT before. They spawned a cottage industry in the Dominican Republic, and Healing Waters International was formed as a nonprofit to lead it. Since then, 90 or so small water enterprises have been founded in Santo Domingo and in the countryside of the Dominican Republic; they continue to operate to this day. From there, the organization extended into the two southernmost states of Mexico, Oaxaca and Chiapas, and into Guatemala and Haiti. Those are the places where we have bases of operations, but we are also active throughout Central America and Africa through partnerships that we’ve formed over the years. Our projects are active in about 480 communities, and we currently serve over 350,000 people in 16 countries. Municipal Water Leader: Would you give us a basic sense of the sorts of projects that Healing Waters International carries out and the infrastructure that it builds? Walter Nonemaker: There are a lot of big nonprofit and governmental efforts to bring water access infrastructure and pipelines into communities, but they often fail to address the problem of water contamination. Without good design for treatment or remediation, a water source cannot be sustainable in a low-resource context. We are trying to address the issue of water safety and quality in challenging contexts in a way that’s reliable and sustainable over the long term. We begin by establishing a connection to a water source like a river, pond, or lake or by bringing in a pipeline from farther away. We do a lot of design and problemsolving to build solar-powered pumping and water lines to bring water to communities that currently do not have sustainable supplies. In some cases, we drill wells. Once we test the water, we design a water treatment solution that is appropriate to the water quality and to the size of the community. We then install the water access and treatment solutions and establish a leadership team in the community, which means empowering some people to be technicians who can operate and do maintenance on the system. We train the community; provide it the materials, logbooks, and quality-control tools it needs; and provide ongoing tech support, training, and monitoring and evaluation services for at least 5 years. Municipal Water Leader: How does the infrastructure that Healing Waters International builds in these locations differ from the drinking water infrastructure that we’d be familiar with in the United States? Walter Nonemaker: The technologies we use and the approach that we take to water treatment, apart from the systems being at a smaller scale, are not too different from the cutting-edge technology that’s used in the United States. In addition to being at a smaller scale, there’s a lot of adaptation that goes into making these things work in environments with fewer resources and lower educational municipalwaterleader.com

levels. We design the systems so that every component is built out in a room where things are mounted along the walls and are accessible and visible. People can see and get their hands on every element of the treatment train, including the feed pumps, retreatments, activated carbon membrane technology, booster pumps, posttreatment, and ultraviolet chlorination elements. That way, it is apparent if a piece is faulty and needs replacing. Municipal Water Leader: Please tell us about one of your projects. Walter Nonemaker: About 2 years ago, we implemented a community water project in a coastal fishing village in Haiti called Anse à Boeuf, which has no land access and no vehicle access. The community is on a remote stretch of beach, and the only way in and out is by boat. The residents are totally reliant on the sea and on boats that deliver supplies like bottled drinking water. The community was surviving by fishing and selling the catch to the boats, and it was spending over half the gross income it obtained by fishing to buy bottled water. The only other water resource the community had was a shallow, hand-dug well close to the beach with highly brackish water that had close to 10,000 parts per million of total dissolved solids. People were resorting to drinking that or mixing it with bottled water, because they couldn’t afford enough bottled water. Healing Waters International was able to adapt that same groundwater supply by implementing a solarpowered reverse osmosis water system. Now for about $2 per family per month, everyone is able to drink safe water with an appropriate level of salts and minerals. They have not only been able to improve their health and recoup half their gross incomes, which they previously had to spend on bottled water, they’ve also been able to save up enough money through the water fees collected by the community to also build a public bathroom. This is planting seeds that will cascade into other forms of community development. M

Rob Anthony is the CEO of Healing Waters International. He can be reached at ranthony@healingwaters.org.

Walter Nonemaker is the director of field operations and lead engineer for Healing Waters International. He can be reached at wnonemaker@healingwaters.org.

October 2021 | MUNICIPAL WATER LEADER

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PM01 Insertion Propeller Meter Available to Replace All Brands of Municipal • Propeller Meters 6” to 72” Telemetry Ready Pulse Output and Optional • 4-20 Madc Output

PM04 Flanged Propeller Meter

Long-life, Water-lubricated Ceramic Bearing • Easy to Read, Stabilized, Non-bounce Graphic Display • Pulse Output Standard •

Seametrics & TechnoFlo - Your Municipal Meter Experts Count on TechnoFlo to meet any of your hard-to-measure and special applications

Contact TECHNOFLO SYSTEMS for details www.technoflo.com Call (559) 783-1207

BUILT IN THE USA

AJ DO VB E RLTI S I STEI N MG ES NT

Does your organization have a job listing you would like to advertise in our pages? Municipal Water Leader provides this service to irrigation districts, water agencies, and hydropower facilities free of charge. For more information, please email Kris Polly at kris.polly@waterstrategies.com. For more information: contact Nick Hidalgo, talent acquisition, at nhidalgo@nwpipe.com, or go to www.nwpipe.com/careers.

+M onitor production & customer

REGIONAL SUPERVISOR PLANT OPERATIONS Location: Adelanto, CA; Tracy, CA; and Portland, OR (Travel 30%) Deadline: Open until filled Salary: Based on qualifications RESPONSIBILITIES: +D irects and coordinates activities concerned with manufacturing of Company products by performing the essential job functions personally or through their subordinates. REQUIREMENTS: +2 -year college or technical school; or three to five years related experience; or equivalent combination of education and experience. +P revious supervisory experience in a manufacturing environment required. +E xperience in a heavy-industrial manufacturing environment preferred. For more information: contact Nick Hidalgo, talent acquisition, at nhidalgo@nwpipe.com, or go to www.nwpipe.com/careers.

PROJECT MANAGER Location: Tracy, CA Deadline: Open until filled Salary: Based on qualifications RESPONSIBILITIES: +D efine specifications and prepare drawings and other submittals as required for projects. +D irect, review, and check work performed by Project Designers. +M anage project files to ensure they are organized and provide current information. +D esign project to minimize manufacturing/shipping costs. +R eview and assess vendor proposals. +C oordinate manufacturing and delivery with shop personnel and customer/engineer. municipalwaterleader.com

schedules. Modify schedules or plans as required. REQUIREMENTS: +C ollege degree in civil engineering, mechanical engineering, or construction management. +M inimum of three years’ work related experience in project management or equivalent combination of education and experience. For more information: contact Nick Hidalgo, talent acquisition, at nhidalgo@nwpipe.com, or go to www.nwpipe.com/careers.

= PROJECT MANAGER Location: Saginaw, TX Deadline: Open until filled Salary: Based on qualifications RESPONSIBILITIES: +D esign, development, and delivery of effective water transmission applications. +L ead design sessions and review sessions with engineering, operations, production control team members, and other members of the organization including all levels of management. +R eview and assess vendor proposals. +M anage multiple, parallel projects using formal project planning techniques. +M anage application design through the various life cycle stages from business needs through design and delivery. REQUIREMENTS: +D emonstrated ability to manage multiple, parallel projects. +M ust have excellent computer skills including MS Word, Excel, CADS, and other project management programs. +E xcellent oral and written communication, advanced mathematics, and analytical and problem solving skills.

LABOR COATING TECHNICIAN Location: Atlanta, GA, and Denver, CO Deadline: Open until filled Salary: Based on qualifications RESPONSIBILITIES: +S urface preparation of the area in which epoxy will be applied. +S andblast to remove debris from metal. +O perate electric and hand tools; operate a high-PSI pressure washer and spray gun. REQUIREMENTS: +M ust be willing to travel in and out of state when needed. +M ust feel comfortable working in a confined space for long periods; must be able to stand for long periods. +W illing to complete a field training in Massachusetts. +M ust be able to work overtime. +A ble to complete a confined space training (provided by A&W); able to complete OSHA 10 and other safety training (provided by A&W); able to travel to Massachusetts for ongoing field training. For more information: For Atlanta position, contact Cherry L. Martinez, senior recruiter, at (407) 287‑8790 or cmartinez@garney.com; For Denver position, contact Ariana Craft, recruiter, at (407) 287‑8808 or

abehler@garney.com. For more job listings, visit municipalwaterleader.com/job-board.

October 2021 | MUNICIPAL WATER LEADER

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Upcoming Events October 3–6 Association of Metropolitan Water Agencies, Executive Management Conference, Denver, CO October 5–9 Water Environment Federation, Technical Exhibition and Conference (WEFTEC), Chicago, IL, and virtual October 6–7 Oregon Water Resources Congress, 2021 Golf Tournament and Water Law Seminar, Sisters, OR October 12 Utah Water Users Association, Utah Water Summit, Provo, UT October 12–13 Nevada Water Resources Association, Minerals and Mine Water Management Symposium, Sparks, NV October 13–15 National Association of Counties, Western Interstate Region Conference, Salt Lake County, UT October 18–21 The California-Nevada Section of the American Water Works Association, Annual Fall Conference, virtual October 20 Texas Water Conservation Association, Fall Conference, San Antonio, TX October 29 Agribusiness & Water Council of Arizona, H2Open Golf Tournament, Casa Grande, AZ November 3–5 National Conference of State Legislatures, Legislative Summit, Tampa, FL November 8–10 National Water Resources Association, 90th Annual Conference, Phoenix, AZ November 15–18 International Water Association, Digital Water Summit, Bilbao, Spain November 17–18 Kansas Water Office, Kansas Governor's Water Conference, Manhattan, KS November 17–19 National Association of Clean Water Agencies, National Clean Water Law & Enforcement Seminar, Charleston, SC November 18–20 National League of Cities, City Summit, Salt Lake City, UT November 30–December 3 Association of California Water Agencies, Fall Conference and Exhibition, Pasadena, CA December 7–10 North Dakota Water Users Association, 58th Annual Joint North Dakota and Upper Missouri Water Convention and Irrigation Workshop, Bismarck, ND December 13‑15 National Association of Clean Water Agencies, Water Utility Resilience Forum, Miami, FL December 14–16 Colorado River Water Users Association, Annual Conference, Las Vegas, NV December 14–16 National Ground Water Association, 2021 Groundwater Week, Nashville, TN, and virtual

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Municipal Water Leader October 2021

Articles inside

Healing Waters International: Addressing the Water Crisis Around the World

Jonathan Grant: Striking a Better Balance for Wastewater at SENTRY

James Dunning: Synergizing Innovation in the Water Sector at Syrinix

The California-Nevada Section of the American Water Works Association

Jenna Covington: Future Planning at the North Texas Municipal Water District

A New Leader for North Texas