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Wichita State students present energy and cybersecurity audit of Augusta wastewater plant
Summary
A Wichita State University student team briefed the Augusta City Council on an energy audit and cybersecurity review of the city wastewater treatment plant, identifying variable-frequency drives for influent pumps, future UV-system replacement and modest solar options as potential savings, and recommending stronger SCADA protections.
Wichita State University engineering students presented a semester-long energy audit and cybersecurity review of the Augusta wastewater treatment plant to the Augusta City Council on May 5, 2025, recommending variable-frequency drives for influent pumps, replacement of the plant's aging UV disinfection system when it reaches end of life, targeted solar deployment, and stepped-up SCADA cybersecurity measures.
The audit team, which included Ever Villalobos, Reed Hopkins, Will Kreiser and a cybersecurity specialist identified as Waleed, said the study analyzed plant energy use from 2022 through 2024 and identified three main technical opportunities for savings: the oxidation ditch aeration system, the influent pump station and the UV disinfection system. Kara McCluskey, the students' faculty sponsor, and industry sponsors Tim Johnson, the city's public utilities director, and Shane Nolan, superintendent of the wastewater treatment plant, supported the project and provided site access.
The students reported that the oxidation ditch already uses dissolved-oxygen monitors and variable-frequency drives (VFDs) tied to those monitors, leaving little additional savings opportunity there. Their report instead highlights the influent pumps as a near-term opportunity: replacing fixed-speed drive arrangements with VFDs could reduce wasted motor energy when pumps are valved down during low flows. The team estimated VFD hardware at about $12,500 per pump and said installing VFDs on three pumps could yield a best-case savings of about 44,000 kilowatt-hours per year with a simple payback of roughly six years. The students noted the per-pump figure came from manufacturer estimates and labeled the cost and savings as approximations pending final vendor quotes.
On the UV disinfection system, the students said the existing configuration allows individual units to be run at different bulb counts (three or six bulbs), but warned that reducing lamp output risks exceeding a local total maximum daily load (TMDL) limit for chloroform. Because of that constraint they did not recommend lowering lamp output on the current system; instead they recommended replacing the UV system at the end of its life with a newer, more efficient model that can better vary output by flow. The students estimated a replacement cost around $50,000 and an energy-savings payback on the order of two decades in their analysis.
The team also modeled a modest 80-kilowatt solar array as the most realistic renewable option for the site. Using the residential electricity rate the students used for their calculations, they estimated annual savings of about $21,000 and a seven- to ten-year payback; they noted savings would scale down if the city could access wholesale rates instead.
On cybersecurity, the students recommended real-time monitoring of the plant's SCADA (supervisory control and data acquisition) system, an incident response plan and moving away from password-based access toward certificate-based authentication. The students cited recent water-utility cyberattacks in other jurisdictions and warned smaller utilities can be attractive targets. They said certificate-based authentication setup costs for a plant this size would likely be on the order of $1,600 to $2,000 per year, and cited commercial providers by name as examples.
Mayor and staff thanked the students and Wichita State for the pro bono analysis; the council did not take formal action on the students' recommendations during the meeting and directed staff to review the report and appendices for potential follow-up. The students said their final written report, including vendor quotes and appendices, is still being completed and will be shared with city staff.
The presentation included site photos and data charts covering 2022'024 flows and energy use, and the students emphasized that the 2022 energy spike corresponded with an operational change during an E. coli outbreak that year, which they said temporarily increased energy demand during treatment operations.
