|
The Wake Forest water treatment plant
may continue to produce water through
next summer, and the town’s wastewater
treatment plant will probably begin to
serve a whole new purpose.
Both plants are now part of
the Raleigh utility system.
City officials had planned
to close the water treatment plant on
Wait Avenue, but a number of concerns
are keeping it in operation.
For one thing, Raleigh
Public Utilities Director Dale Crisp
said this week, there was the drought
this past summer. The area is still far
short of its normal rainfall, and Falls
Lake is still about 3 feet lower than
its normal level.
“The predictions are it [the
lake] will refill in the next month,”
Crisp said, “but the question is what’s
next summer going to be like.”
The city council, at Crisp’s
recommendation, has kept the level two
water conservation measures in place.
The Wake Forest plant draws
its water from a reservoir on Smith
Creek, which was less affected by the
drought than Falls Lake and maintained
most of its storage through the summer.
In normal operation, the plant produces
1.2 million gallons a day although it
can produce up to 2 million gallons.
The other reason for keeping
the water plant in operation is that a
second water connection to Raleigh is
not complete. The first connection, the
original one, is a waterline that runs
along Capital Boulevard.
The second connection is the
waterline along Forestville Road, which
is in place, but the pumps in the new
station at Forestville and U.S. 401 have
not been delivered. That project is
about 60 percent complete, Crisp said.
There will be a third
connection from Wakefield into the town
once the 1-million-gallon water tank on
Falls of the Neuse Road and a new
waterline along Falls to feed it are
complete.
This third connection will
provide more water pressure for the
northern part of town and other
low-lying areas because that tower is at
a higher elevation.
In December, when the town
board approved the Sedgefield Park North
subdivision that is in both Wake and
Franklin counties, there was a condition
that no building permits could be issued
until that high pressure zone for water
was complete.
Reusing our water
Raleigh has hired a
consultant, Crisp said, to start the
design for a water reuse facility at the
wastewater treatment plant on Smith
Creek at the Neuse River.
“That plant produces an
effluent quality that’s so good it only
makes sense to use the water again,”
Crisp said.
Reuse water can be piped to
irrigate lawns and for a number of
commercial, industrial and private uses.
The town of Zebulon has used
effluent from its wastewater plant to
irrigate the playing surface at the
Tri-County [Mudcats] Stadium for years,
and Cary has a number of ways in which
it reuses its water.
Tuesday Wake Forest Town
Manager Mark Williams said he and other
town officials had long been concerned
about the use of drinking water to
irrigate lawns. Although only one or two
were listed in the December building
permits for Wake Forest, there are
usually several permits for residential
irrigation systems each month and some
may be installed as homes are built. |
