News
Victor Harbor WWTP Wins National Engineering Excellence Award
9th January 2007
Victor Harbor’s new wastewater treatment plant has gained national recognition by taking out the Environmental Category at the 2006 National Engineering Excellence Awards as the best environmental project in Australia.
The Engineering Excellence Awards program is staged by Engineers Australia.
Recognition at national level followed on the project being the overall winner as well as taking out the environmental category at Engineers Australia’s South Australian Engineering Excellence Awards event.
The treatment plant, which has been provided by United Utilities Australia (UUA) through a Build Own Operate Transfer contract with SA Water, has also won an Infrastructure Development and Management Award from the Australian Water Association.
During project definition phase SA Water determined that the new facility would be required to produce treated effluent of an exceptionally high standard. This treated effluent would then be used for unrestricted irrigation and to provide seasonal flows in the local Inman River. To meet reuse and discharge standards, nitrogen and phosphorus reduction capabilities were seen as key elements of the new plant’s process design.
Recognising that such a plant would need to be state of the art, SA Water commissioned concept investigations into treatment technologies likely to be offered by contractors.
Expert advice, sought both in Australia and overseas led to SA Water identifying biological nutrient removal (BNR) followed by membrane filtration technology as a preferred option.
In its winning bid, UUA offered a membrane bioreactor system (MBR) comprising an advanced BNR activated sludge treatment process with simultaneous nitrification and denitrification (SND) and enhanced phosphorus reduction by alum precipitation. The process operates within a bioreactor system utilising for the first time in Australia in a facility of this size, Kubota flat sheet ultra filtration membranes.
The plant, designed for a long term contributing population of 25,000 at an annual average flow capacity of 5.1 megalitres / day, became fully operational in October 2005, less than 16 months after financial close. An indication of the quality of the design and construction management employed by UUA was that the facility was ramped up to full performance only six weeks after the introduction of seeding sludge.
This works delivery program was achieved despite a delay caused by the original design and construction sub - contractor going into receivership, leading to the subsequent novation of these works to Tenix Alliance.
Since its commission the plant has produced treated wastewater to a standard at least equal to and often exceeding the best achieved in Australia to date. Quality is certainly far better than the criteria for Class A reclaimed water for reuse as defined in the South Australian Reclaimed Water Guidelines established by the State’s Department of Health and Environment Protection Agency.
Total phosphorous concentration is being reduced by more than 99.5% - the lowest phosphorus target yet attempted in Australia and one considered to be very low by world standards. Nitrogen reduction is also exceptional.
The system operates in the ultrafiltration range, removing micro-organisms of bacteria size and around 99.9% of know viruses. Clarity of the treated effluent is better than the level required for potable water under Australian Drinking Water Quality Guidelines.
UV disinfection completes the treatment process.
Treated effluent is stored in an old SA Water reservoir in the nearby hills which has been re-commissioned. While UUA provides environmental flows to the Inman River, subject to EPA guidelines, SA Water has retained responsibility for the sale of irrigation water. Currently a local golf course is the major customer.
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