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Sewerage

Goals related to sewerage

  • Ensure stringent regulatory obligations are met
  • Develop and implement efficient capital investment and operations programs
  • Deliver safe sewage transfer, treatment and disposal
  • Improve river health and the marine environment
  • Minimise waste disposal and maximise resource recovery

Key achievements

  • Improved the Eastern Treatment Plant’s performance by generating electricity using biogas from the treatment process, delivering odour-reduction works, carrying out a triple bottom line study that will result in the construction of a new pre-treatment facility, and completing a comprehensive safety case
  • Began work on a tertiary treatment upgrade to the Eastern Treatment Plant as ammonia reduction works and scientific investigations continued, which will enable the plant to expand water recycling and reduce its environmental impact
  • Developed and tested new technologies at the Western Treatment Plant to desludge treatment lagoons under membrane covers
  • Completed a five-year Environment Improvement Plan for the Western Treatment Plant and commissioned a biological odour control plant.

Disappointments

  • A significant incident at the Eastern Treatment Plant in which a number of employees fell ill after recycled water was inadvertently supplied through a drinking water tap
  • A small chlorinated water leak at the Western Treatment Plant
  • Not meeting our targets for the beneficial reuse of biosolids.

Challenges

  • Resolving the future of the ocean outfall at Boags Rocks, which discharges treated effluent from the Eastern Treatment Plant
  • Continuing to reduce odour as residential and recreational assets are developed closer to sewage treatment plants
  • Reducing the amount of stored biosolids at both sewage treatment plants.