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CHARTER OF THE RICHMOND UTILITIES DISTRICT
NEW CONNECTION APPLICATIONS:
WATER-NEW ESTABLISHMENT OF SERVICE
SEWER APPLICATION TO CONNECT TO PUBLIC SEWER
SEWER PERMIT TO CONNECT TO PUBLIC SEWER
Project Description
The Richmond Utilities District operates a 46,000 LF sewerage collection system that serves 563 connected customers. Raw sewage flows to a wastewater treatment plant on Water Street that moves pollutants from the sewage and transforms it into clean effluent. A main pump station is located on Front Street and the District Office is located on Front Street in Richmond. A location map can be found on the contact page. The treatment facility was constructed in 1965 as a primary plant that utilized an Imhoff tank to settle pollutants out of the water. In 1989, the plant was upgraded to the current secondary treatment configuration by the addition of an oxidation ditch and two 25′ final clarifiers. Microbes are grown in the oxidation ditch to biodegrade the incoming organic pollutants. The microbes are then settled out of the water in the final clarifiers. The clarified element is disinfected with chlorine and discharged in the Kennebec River.
The plant was originally designed to process an average daily flow of 320,000 GPD and a peak hourly flow of 936,000 GPD. It also has a stated design capacity to process up to 400 lbs./day of organic loading and 450 lbs./day of solids loading. The facility is currently underloaded and receives less that 40% of its stated design capacity under normal loading conditions. However, peak wet weather flows are often greater than the plant’s design capacityAt flows above 650,000 GPD, the plant’s final clarifiers become unstable and are prone to solids washout.
Some of the plan’t original equipment and processes are now over fifty years old. Other equipment has been in place for over twenty seven years since the plan’s last upgrade. The overall facility is well beyond the twenty year useful life for which it was designed. Recently, the District has received direction from the Maine Department of Environmental Protection to address deficiencies at the treatment facilities. (see appendix A) The plant is now at the age where it has a greater chance of equipment failure and increased maintenance needs. Several key unit processes at the plant are obsolete, inadequate or inefficient.