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City of Vancouver, WA

Vancouver WA

Industry

Municipal

Opportunity

The City of Vancouver, Washington, typically treats more than 20 million gallons of wastewater each day. This requires substantial aeration systems and ultraviolet (UV) light arrays at the city’s two wastewater treatment plants (WWTPs). While these systems are critical for supporting the biological treatment process and destroying harmful bacteria and pathogens, they consume large quantities of power.

Results

By replacing one of the four existing blowers at each plant with a new turbo unit, the city was able to realize signi cant energy savings and payback their initial investment in less than two years.

SEM Partner

Bonneville Power Administration

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Through a series of workshops and a subsequent energy audit, we found that we could improve our energy performance without impacting water quality.

Frank Dick

Industrial Pretreatment Coordinator, City of Vancouver

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About the City of Vancouver, WA

The City of Vancouver is heavily committed to energy efficiency. The city's active commitment to sustainability and energy optimization is evident across several key areas, including the Green Building Program, which introduces new building and development code standards and incentives to significantly reduce energy use and emissions and increase protections from the effects of climate change.

The Challenge

The City of Vancouver, Washington, typically treats more than 20 million gallons of wastewater each day. This requires substantial aeration systems and ultraviolet (UV) light arrays at the city’s two wastewater treatment plants (WWTPs). While these systems are critical for supporting the biological treatment process and destroying harmful bacteria and pathogens, they consume large quantities of power.

 

The Solution

“Through a series of workshops and a subsequent energy audit, we found that we could improve our energy ef ciency without impacting water quality,” says Dick. “We also learned that we could receive rebates for energy ef cient equipment and incentives for power reductions from Clark Public Utilities, so we jumped at the opportunity.”

These incentives and rebates are supported by the Bonneville Power Administration’s Energy Smart Industrial program, which works with Northwest public utilities and their industrial customers – offering project management, technical assistance and nancial incentives – to advance energy ef ciency throughout the Northwest. With the help of BPA’s ESI program and Clark Public Utilities, the City of Vancouver has made a series of energy improvements at its WWTPs.

 

The Results

All told, the improvements are saving the city roughly one million kilowatt-hours and tens of thousands of dollars per year. ESI support and utility incentives covered about 30 percent of the project’s capital costs. And more energy upgrades are on the horizon.

The multi-stage centrifugal blowers at Vancouver’s WWTPs were running just fine, but they were outdated and inefficient compared to newer airfoil turbo blowers. By replacing one of the four existing blowers at each plant with a new turbo unit, the city was able to realize signi cant energy savings and payback their initial investment in less than two years.

“We used to have two blowers constantly running at each facility,” explains Aaron Kraft, Project Manager for Veolia Water North America, which operates the WWTPs for the City of Vancouver. “Now we can get by with a single turbo blower at each treatment plant most of the time.”

 

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