NEWS RELEASE

March 29, 2018

For Immediate Release

City Commits to Updating Wastewater Infrastructure 

SAVANNAH, GA (March 29, 2018) — The City of Savannah Mayor and Council are moving forward on updating the President’s Street Water Reclamation Facility which will allow the City to phase out the incineration method of wastewater treatment which has recently experienced increased federal regulation.

Historically, the waste solids produced at the President Street Water Reclamation Facility were incinerated.  The incinerators were part of the original plant construction, completed in 1976. Due to more stringent air quality rules recently required by the Federal Environmental Protection Agency, the City has been forced to choose between major upgrades to the old incinerators or new means of bio-solid disposal. 

Updating the incinerators was determined to be unfeasible because refurbishing the incinerators and adding the necessary air emissions controls was estimated to cost approximately $29 million dollars. The option to refurbish the incinerators was also not selected due to concerns that air emission standards would continue to get stricter, requiring increasingly more complicated and costly updates. The current (interim) practice of handling bio-solids involves two costly arrangements. First, hauling the bio-solids safely from the plant to a landfill and second, to appropriately compensate a landfill for disposing of the bio-solid waste. The cost associated with this method does not make it a long term solution.

The least expensive long-term solution identified is adding a facility that will allow the bio-solids to be dried. Drying the bio-solids will allow the City to reduce hauling and landfill disposal costs as well as save valuable landfill space. The construction of the President Street bio-solid facility will cost approximately $20.5 million dollars. The investment will be funded by increasing the existing President Street Service Area Capital Recovery Charge by $250 dollars. The Capital Recovery Charge is only associated with new properties connecting to the City’s water and sewer infrastructure. No existing City customers will be impacted by this capital recovery charge increase. The facility will be located on the existing facility site.