Spanish Fork begins commissioning of new water reclamation plant; treated discharge scheduled

Spanish Fork City staff told the City Council on Sept. 2 that the new Spanish Fork Water Reclamation Facility has reached required biological targets and will begin routing treated effluent through its membrane filtration system beginning tomorrow, with contractors and vendor staff on site during the initial full-flow tests.

The plant’s operations team reported that total suspended solids in the biology tanks reached about 3,200 milligrams per liter — above the 3,000 mg/L target the project team set — which cleared the way to begin accepting a measured stream of sewage from 200 East and 247. Staff said the contractor has reached substantial completion but that final acceptance and turnover are expected later in the year after remaining frontage and landscaping work is finished.

Corey Pierce, who led the update, told the council the plant has been through multiple testing phases. “Today we are 3,200,” he said of the suspended solids reading, and added, “This will be the first time that we're discharging treated effluent from the new treatment plant.” Pierce described a recent equipment problem during testing: automated sensors indicated screens were ready when they were not, resulting in roughly 15 minutes of unintended flow — about 50,000 gallons — being routed inside the building before staff shut pumps down. He said the overflow was contained to the building and that vendors are replacing affected motors and equipment as needed.

Pierce said the contractor and Memcor, the membrane vendor, will have personnel on site for the initial run and that the city has staged pumps and contingency measures to address surprises during the startup. He explained that staff had run clean water and staged tests for weeks before introducing sewage to grow the biological population in the treatment trains. “The contractor has reached substantial completion, which means we can run wastewater through the plant and everything functions,” he said, but added that contractual punch-list work remains.

Council members asked about capacity. Pierce said current system flows vary after storms but the plant’s average annual design capacity is about 6,650,000 gallons per day; recent daily flows had been about 4.5–5.0 million gallons. He said the new facility adds roughly 2 million gallons of treatment capacity compared with the city’s prior configuration and that the headworks and disinfection components were sized larger (to about 12 million gallons per day) to accommodate future growth.

The council heard that the city will bring limited flows online first (a small flow from 200 East and 247), add flow from Main Street about one week later, and then aim to move to full routing thereafter if tests proceed without issue. Staff emphasized that contractors remain on site through the transition and that final ownership transfer will follow completion of remaining site work and vendor punch lists.

Pierce and staff noted that lessons from the recent startup — particularly equipment and controls integration — informed updated operational checks to reduce risk during subsequent increases in flow.

The council did not take formal action on the report; the presentation was provided as an operational update and to inform upcoming project closeout and future reporting to the council.