Pumphouse upgrade on the way

DIDSBURY - Upgrade work is set to soon get underway at the Butte pumphouse, say officials.

Located at the Didsbury Golf Club next to the giant water tower with the golfer painted on the side, the facility provides water for the town.

Doing the work on the upgrade for the town is Balzer's Canada Inc., based in Rocky View County.

The total price tag for the work is $216,800 with some of the funding coming from both the provincial and federal governments, and the town paying the remainder.

"We've had this on our budget for about four years, putting money aside," said Greg Skotheim, manager of public works and infrastructure. "It's under Canada's Clean Water and Waste Water fund. This year they've allowed the funding for $87,500. That's their (provincial and federal) portion of the 50/50 grant."

The pumphouse upgrade will include new piping, valves, VFD pumps and pressure regulation, he said.

Water for the pumphouse comes from the Mountain View Regional Water Services Commission (MVRWSC) from the Anthony Henday Water Treatment Plant near Innisfail.

"This is where the water comes in from MVRWSC," he said. "It goes through their smaller facility and then it goes in our water reservoir, which is the large, round facility with the big golfer on it (at the golf course). It also goes into a smaller, underground reservoir that was here since the days when the town was on a well system."

The Anthony Henday plant is classified by Alberta Environment as a Class III water treatment facility.

MVRWSC is responsible for the treatment, storage and distribution to six member communities. The Red Deer River is the source of raw water for the treatment plant.

"It's pumped to a mainline reservoir in Olds," he said. "From Olds it comes to all the communities to the south including Carstairs, Crossfield and Didsbury. The water is all treated. They fill up the reservoir every night. We have a pumping (distribution) system that pumps water through our whole town."

The reservoir holds 2,270 cubic metres of water. On an average day, the town uses 1,500 cubic metres' volume of water, he said.

The pumphouse contains three pumps and is based on pressure, he said.

"When the pressure gets lower another pump kicks on," he said. "Generally, one pump is always running. Because we're on a hill it gives us probably about 35 pounds of pressure just based on the location. Gravity helps with the process."

Once people have used the water at their residence it goes into the town sewer system, he said.

"It goes through our sanitary system through town," he said. "We have a series of lagoons to the east of town, and a large lagoon located two kilometres east of town. That's where the storage cell is. From there it's every year in the fall, we release into the Rosebud Creek, which goes into the Red Deer River."

The wastewater is all monitored by Alberta Environment and the federal government, he said.

"It's a process of going up and down through different ponds and it gets filtered over time that way," he said. "Finally, in the storage cell it sits for a while and wave action is used. We've had really good results in our releases each fall."

The upgrades to the Butte pumphouse are timely, he said.

"We've been upgrading over the years, but it needs an overhaul," he said. "A lot of the equipment is over 40 years old. Some of the pumps have been changed out, but we want to upgrade the whole facility, the piping, the valving, the pressure system, new pumps. Just make it so that if there is an issue we have valves that work and we can handle anything that comes along."

Another big upgrade recently added is the online chlorometers, which allow the town to check chlorine at any time, he said.

"That's a really big upgrade for us," he said. "Water safety is a priority for our department."

The town has staff members that conduct daily tests of the water, he said.

"Every week we send two water samples to the lab and they review it for coliforms (bacteria) and that sort of thing," he said. "We've never had a bad test in the last three or four years. We're doing well. I tell people, our water is as good as you can get from Anthony Henday. It goes through membrane filtration and also through UV disinfectant. The quality is there."

The upgrade work itself will begin in mid-September, he said.

"They're (Balzer's) starting right now," he said. "We've had a meeting to go over safety and scheduling. They're making and purchasing the valves and piping. The project will start the middle of September and go into November.

"They should be done by the end of November. We should see no disruption of service. We might have one day where we have to shut off some valves. It might reduce people's pressure but, hopefully, that will be as bad as it gets."

Every residence in Didsbury has a water meter reading system so the town can monitor for leaks, he said.

"It tells us every 15 minutes how much water they've used," he said. "It also allows us to drive around town and get your water reads and bill you based on that, rather than coming to your house and those types of things. It's called an automatic meter reading system."