Wheeler, Texas is the county seat of Wheeler County in the northeast panhandle of the state about 90 minutes east of Amarillo. The population is about 1,500.

The Oklahoma and Texas border is about 15 minutes to the east of this city. Oklahoma City is about 160 miles even further east.

U.S. Route 83 is a main route that connects to the Great Plain and State Route 152 runs through the city to the east.

There are various attractions in this area including the historical museum, city park & walking trails, Wheeler Area Aquatics Center, Tom Britt Memorial Park, and the Old Mobeetie Jail Museum.

Some of the favorite local restaurants are Cross Country Barn, Kim’s Kitchen, La Cabana, Maxey’s Steakhouse, Soto’s Family Restaurant, Mel’s Diner, and Sunset Diner.

Enbridge Energy Partners and Audubon Engineering coordinated to build the Enbridge Ajax Gas Plant in Wheeler, Texas. The plant is a cryogenic natural gas processing plant with a capacity of 150 million cubic feet per day.

It extracts natural gas liquids and creates a pipeline quality natural gas from wellhead natural gas streams. PCL Industrial Construction Co. installed all structural steel, equipment, piping, and electrical work, including switchgear and transformers.

One aspect of this plant was the stormwater and industrial process water pump system. These agencies chose Romtec Utilities to design, manufacture, and supply their pump station system.

This package pump system was designed to meet a low flow of industrial process water with added low flows of industrial stormwater.

The dual purposes of this pump station required shaft-driven centrifugal pumps with motors located above-grade. The precast concrete sump was cast with a rectangular monolithic base to eliminate extra joints below the grade. The rectangular sump included a barrier wall, or weir wall, to separate grit and suspended particles from any stormwater runoff to protect the valves and pump impellers.

The package approach to pump stations was attractive to Enbridge because aspects of the pump station could be managed by its engineering staff, such as the electrical controls.

This approach was attractive to Audubon Engineering because it would complete one aspect of the total construction project allowing their staff to focus on the key systems of the Ajax Plant operation. Romtec Utilities provided a custom package that met the unique needs of this industrial client.

For the Ajax Gas Plant, Enbridge and Audubon wanted to eliminate any possible points of weakness from the station. Romtec Utilities worked with Colorado Precast to design and cast a monolithic 11-foot-tall wet well.

The station was engineered with vertical sump pumps for industrial water applications. These pumps are intended to handle the suspended particles, like grit and hydrocarbons, that wash into the system during a stormwater event.

All the stormwater gets pumped into what is called a “slop” holding tank. The tank is then emptied into trucks which transport the water to an offsite treatment facility.

This package lift station for the Ajax Gas Plant in Wheeler, Texas met the needs of Enbridge and Audubon for this natural gas plant as Romtec Utilities provided the design, manufacture, and supply of this pump station.