Romtec Utilities recently started-up a new wastewater lift station that was designed, manufactured, and supplied to meet the specific standards of the City of Snoqualmie. This project was for a 34 lot addition to the Snoqualmie II residential development to handle sanitary sewer from the homes and pump it to gravity lines. Romtec Utilities helped the developer, PulteGroup, get its lift station manufactured and delivered so that its development could move forward.
A major part of this project was meeting the design standards the City of Snoqualmie established for new wastewater lift stations. For Snoqualmie, it is very important that each new pumping system includes the same design and supply principles as the other systems it operates and maintains. Having a defined design standard is advantageous for city maintenance personnel because it provides a consistent basis for operations and less need to stockpile backup/replacement components. Romtec Utilities began this project by learning exactly what the City standard was to design the correct lift station to meet its approval.
The Snoqualmie standard specifies a very nice system for use near a residential community. There are several prominent design features that make the Snoqualmie standard special. The most noticeable is the concrete control building. For this project the control building was supplied by Romtec, Inc., the sister company of Romtec Utilities. Per the design standard, the control build contains the complete electrical controls and the emergency standby generator.
The electrical controls were designed and installed as a Motor Control Center, MCC, configuration. This configuration separates control components into separate electrical enclosures, making operation safer and more standardized. These controls include Supervisory Control And Data Acquisition, SCADA, through a Motorola ACE3600. Romtec Utilities engineered the electrical control system to function with the Snoqualmie standard components.
The Romtec Utilities design and supply also included a Siemens Bioxide chemical feed system for the lift station odor control. This system drips the proprietary Bioxide chemical into the wet well of the lift station. This chemical fosters bacterial development that prevents the development of hydrogen sulfide gas. Not only is hydrogen sulfide odor detectable and unpleasant in small concentrations, it is also corrosive to exposed components. Eliminating hydrogen sulfide provides many benefits to the long-term maintenance of a sanitary sewer pumping system.
In addition to these major aspects of the Snoqualmie standard design, this system also included a number of smaller features. A cable tray provides easy access to electrical conduit running from the custom disconnect panel to the in-well control devices. A gas leak detection unit was integrated into the controls and installed in the control building to monitor the natural gas powered generator. Romtec, Inc. also provided a sidewall exhaust fan to ventilate the building.
Although it takes a lot of communication, learning and understanding city design standards is an important step to developing reliable and correct lift stations. For this project, Romtec Utilities traveled to Snoqualmie on multiple occasions to visit existing lift stations. Romtec Utilities opted to take these trips to improve our understanding of the design standards with the intent of improving our ability to participate in new lift station projects with the City of Snoqualmie. Ongoing education about meeting design standards is just one way that Romtec Utilities works to develop the nation’s best lift stations. This new system for the Snoqualmie Ridge II development is a great example of that work.