To reduce the risk of damage to ultraviolet (UV) bulbs through weekly maintenance cleaning at its wastewater treatment plant, the Saskatchewan city of North Battleford is spending more than $528,000 to upgrade its 20-year-old low-pressure UV disinfection system to a new high-pressure one from Trojan Technologies.
Upgrading the system to the TrojanUV3000Plus, with the addition of an overhead service crane worth $100,000, will allow easier access for cleaning and reduce the risk of damaging the expensive bulbs, a city staff report proposed.
According to Kevin Kristian, North Battleford’s water and wastewater plants’ superintendent of operations, an upgrade to high-pressure bulbs will create significant savings because it fits into the existing system’s channel and “no engineering design will be required,” he wrote in a report to city council. The new system is also expected to minimize downtime and disruption to the wastewater process, he wrote.
Kristian also noted that the new UV system will increase the disinfection of sewage. He adds that the current system is not meeting permit requirements, and is already beyond its life expectancy. In 2020, the current system had two exceedances of the monthly limit, and exceedances of the two consecutive week limit due to high influent flows.
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An analysis by North Battleford’s administration suggests that the current UV system may be operating as low as 48%, which is significantly below the original design rating of 65%.
“The lower the UV value, the more power is required for disinfection,” Kristian’s report states.
The new UV system, provided through eda Environmental Ltd. as a supplier in Winnipeg, would be compatible with the current system’s peak design flow of 11,950 m³ per day.
