Nick Seals, superintendent of the Rock Springs water reclamation facility, led visiting city officials on a tour of the plant and outlined how sewage is screened, biologically treated and discharged.

Seals said the facility removes inorganics at the headworks, runs roughly 2,000,000 gallons per day through the screens and uses a camera inspection program to prioritize pipe replacement. “When you flush at home, it goes into a series of pipes…part of our job is to maintain that system,” Seals said, describing a combination sewer cleaner and the camera rig used to inspect lines.

The tour emphasized the plant’s biological process: wastewater moves into oxidation ditches where aeration encourages ammonia-oxidizing bacteria to convert ammonia to nitrite and nitrate, and other microbial populations then denitrify nitrate into nitrogen gas. An operator demonstrated a settleometer test used to measure how well biomass settles; the staff monitor settling rates and holding times to avoid sending excess biomass into Bitter Creek.

After biological treatment the plant uses clarifiers to separate settled biomass from clarified water, then applies ultraviolet disinfection before discharge. Seals described the clarifiers as about 14 feet deep and noted the treated water flows to Bitter Creek and downstream waterways.

The plant also handles biosolids: Seals described gravity-belt thickening and centrifuging that concentrate solids from a few percent up to roughly 20% total solids before windrowing or drying. “We test it for the pathogens. We test for metals…by EPA standards, it's safe for human contact,” Seals said, explaining the product can be used as a soil amendment after meeting Class A EQ biosolids standards.

Seals announced the facility is building a greenhouse-style solar dryer with automatic turners and in-floor heat to enable year-round drying and reduce springtime odors. He said the dryer is under construction and “be complete, hopefully by June,” and that the project is partially funded by specific purpose tax revenue and an ARPA grant.

Visitors repeatedly praised the staff and the scale of operations. The tour concluded with thanks from the visiting official, who described the visit as “a wonderful tour” and said the demonstration clarified how wastewater is processed and why the plant’s work matters to downstream users.

The facility’s staff supplied multiple operational details during the tour, including cleaning schedules, inspection tools, and treatment steps; the city did not take any formal votes or make regulatory changes during the visit. Further permitting, operational changes or community distribution of biosolids would follow normal administrative steps not completed during the tour.