Expensive magic: Why Perrysburg water, sewer rates are increasing

Every day, 6 million gallons of storm and sanitary water go into — and come out of — the City of Perrysburg’s wastewater treatment plant along the Maumee River.

The water is treated biologically and chemically, with some nutrients like phosphorus and ammonia removed.

“It’s the closest thing to magic that I’ve ever seen,” said Matt Choma, Perrysburg’s director of public utilities. “You’re taking the foulest of the foul coming into the plant — I mean just disgusting — and through mechanical, chemical, and biological operations, you’re putting out water that’s cleaner in the river.”

It’s clean — and expensive.

It’s expected that Perrysburg City Council will vote in June to increase water and sewer rates over the next two years. The proposal is to increase water rates by 10 percent on July 1, 2024, 10 percent on Jan. 1, 2025, and another 10 percent on Jan. 1, 2026, according to city council discussion. Sewer rates may also go up 6 percent on each of those dates.

Perrysburg spokesman Marie Dunn said the actual rate reflected on the bill will be an overall 8 percent or $6.25 average per month, per customer additional charge. The last water rate increase in Perrysburg was 3 percent on Jan. 1.

Staff recently gave a tour of the plant, which is off West Boundary Street, adjacent to Orleans Park, and along the river. The treated water in the river then flows northeast to Lake Erie.

It’s sometimes smelly and downright gross — “sludge happens” is a common joke. It’s also complicated and frankly fascinating when shown the myriad of stuff — not just water — that comes in and the clean water that ends up going out into the river.

The treatment process

The initial sewer dump is corralled into a pool at the west end of the plant, called a primary. A giant arm rotates slowly along the top, separating water and debris.

Bicycle parts, balls, jewelry, tampons, a $100 bill — everything that comes into a sewer or toilet — makes its way to the treatment plant.

“It’s like a horizontal tornado in there,” said assistant plant manager Matthew Hess. “It helps separate those heavier-than-water items, settles it down to a bottom channel.”

The goal is to install two additional primary tanks like this one. One is expected to be built in 2026 at a cost of $15 million.

The primary effluent then heads to 1,200 diffusers, which is “where the magic happens,” Mr. Hess said. The rectangular tanks that serpentine back and forth hold what looks like a big bubbling chocolate milkshake — it’s not poop, that’s later.

“That brown stuff is a bio-mass ... of millions of species of bio-organisms,” Mr. Hess said. “There’s a specific species in there, that do a specific job.”

Nitrifiers take out the ammonia, for example.

In a brick building just beyond the rectangle ponds, 250-horsepower motors create the air that constantly flows through the water.

“It requires a lot of electricity to turn that motor,” Mr. Hess said.

The friction of the air is so warm that in the winter, operators will come out just to touch the hot pipe, he said.

The water then flows to secondary settling tanks for the final separation. There are four tanks close to the river.

“They act the exact same way as the primary does,” Mr. Hess said. “This tank separates the brown sludge in the bubble tanks and the water.”

Another sludge blanket is created at the bottom of the tank, with the clean water rising to the top.

Next, dissolved oxygen is introduced.

“The EPA permit says that have to have at least 5 milligrams per liter of dissolved oxygen in the water before it sees the river,” Mr. Hess said.

The final treatment is ultra-violet lighting, which inactivates bacteria, viruses, and parasites.

“This is just a way of taking phosphorus out biologically, instead of chemical,” said Mickey Shank, plant manager.

The UV process has been used in Perrysburg since 2011. It was rebuilt with new bulbs and ballasts two years ago for $186,000.

“It’s the safer way to get away from chlorine disinfection that was used primarily by everybody in the ‘70s and ‘80s,” Mr. Hess said. “It’s safer for operations. It’s safe for the community.”

‘Sludge happens’

It’s not pleasant — that’s the warning before entering this building on the south side of the campus.

Just to be clear, sludge is another name for poop.

This process takes the digested sludge and removes the water from it, coming up with a solid. The solid is either hauled away and applied to a farm field or taken to the landfill.

The city spent $1.5 million for a new de-watering press three years ago, Mr. Shank said.

“If you want to understand how a treatment plant works — it’s pretty much like the human body,” Mr. Hess said. “The human body brings in water, brings in solids, brings in nutrients, utilizes the nutrients.”

“And out the back end, you’ve got water, gas, and you’ve got solids,” he said.

Water, water everywhere

The plant relies on gravity, with a 17-foot gradual drop from where the water comes in, to when it is deposited into the river.

“The actual treatment process has not changed for a hundred years,” Mr. Hess said. “It’s still the same. Obviously, the efficiency of the equipment has increased.”

The pump runs 365 days a year.

“That’s why the equipment can get expensive, because it’s extremely heavy-duty, and it runs 24 hours a day, all year long,” Mr. Hess said.

Perrysburg is a class IV plant, which has the highest output. It is staffed one shift per day.

The current Perrysburg system is designed for 8 million gallons a day, with a maximum of 24 million gallons during wet-weather events.

“When we get high flows above 8½ to 9 million gallons per day, we have to physically pump the effluent,” Mr. Shank said.

When there’s a heavy rain event or snow melt, there are extra pumps that kick in, he said. Each pump can handle 13 million gallons per day.

“Only on a rare occasion are both of these running,” he said.

This is also used when the river is too high.

“That can only get up to a certain point when we gravity out, as well,” Mr. Shank said. “The river actually wants to come back into the plant. We have a check valve ... that prevents the river from flowing back into the plant.

“We don’t have to intervene. It automatically senses the levels and takes over after that,” Mr. Shank said.

There’s also a high-powered 1.6-megawatt generator on site in case the power goes out. Mr. Hess said it can run some of the city, along with the wastewater treatment plant, if needed.

Mr. Hess reiterated: The water always flows, and they must be prepared for all scenarios.

“The water will not stop coming down that hill, no matter what,” he said. “We can’t shut a valve and say, ‘OK, city of Perrysburg, you’ve got to hold on to that while we fix something.’”

The Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition system, which is housed at the main building, provides additional monitoring.

“If any one of these pumps is triggered, it automatically calls an operator who’s on call,” Mr. Hess said. “We rely on this system to watch the plant after hours.”