Due to the growing menace of blue-green algae, upgrades are needed for the tri-community water treatment plant.
The facility underwent an extensive assessment in 2017 to ensure it met quality guidelines and regulations.
City engineer Jack MacDonald says that same year, the Tower Road reservoir experienced an algae bloom.
“If it gets to a bloom stage and it produces toxins, some of the toxins it produces are harmful to humans,” MacDonald says.
Toxins can cause skin, eye and throat irritation and other serious health effects such as gastrointestinal illness.
“It’s something we have to take seriously from a drinking water quality perspective, so we started to take a look at what our options were,” says MacDonald.
MacDonald says the facility wasn’t built to process blue-green algae and now needs to be upgraded.
The first phase of the project will start this winter and aims at expanding the facility and the addition of equipment for the treatment of blue green algae.
The second phase will focus on toxins being removed and is set to begin in the 2021-2022 winter season.
MacDonald says they will be doing the work over the winter as parts of the plant have to be closed and there is less water consumption during the winter months.
Phase one will cost about 6 million dollars while phase two will be closer to 21 million.
Provincial and federal funding will be contributed for the project.
