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Ponoka tests new technology at sewage lagoon

Feb 1, 2018 | 4:36 AM

PONOKA- The Town of Ponoka is hosting a six-month pilot project at its Waste Water Treatment Facility to test and evaluate the potential benefits of new waste water filtration technology. 

The new technology is owned and developed by Edmonton-based Swirltex.

The project is being funded through a provincial grant from the Alberta Innovates Water Innovation Program, which supports initiatives that promote improved water productivity, healthy aquatic ecosystems and safe, secure drinking water.  

“Participating in this pilot project allows us to observe and assess the performance and potential benefits of this new technology first-hand in our own lagoon system at no cost to the Town,” said Dwayne Kwolick, Manager of Operations for the Town of Ponoka. “Swirltex will cover all energy, maintenance and all other costs associated with the trial.” The benefits we’re expecting to see with this new technology include an even higher quality of treated waste water than we see with our current lagoon system, as well as an accelerated waste water treatment process that could expand the capacity of our lagoon system by allowing us to process much higher volumes of effluent year round,” said Kwolick. “If the technology performs as expected, that accelerated treatment process and increased lagoon capacity could allow us to support much greater population growth in Ponoka at a lower energy cost than our current waste water treatment system, without having to incur the major capital cost of physically expanding our lagoon system,” said Kwolick. 

The Town will continue to conduct scheduled bi-annual discharges of its treated waste water during the six month trial and will also continue to send weekly waste water samples for laboratory testing to ensure the treated water meets safe and acceptable water quality standards.

Once the pilot project is completed, the results will be studied to determine whether the benefits generated by the technology make it worthwhile to implement at the sewage lagoon on a more permanent basis.

(Gary McKinnon – The Town of Ponoka)