Yelm City Council approves two amendments for Phase 2 of Water Reclamation Facility upgrades

Though the City of Yelm’s $36 million Water Reclamation Facility (WRF) was up and running in the summertime, Cody Colt, Yelm’s public works director, asked the Yelm City Council to approve two amendments to Phase 2 of WRF upgrades in a professional services agreement with Parametrix.

Yelm City Council unanimously approved the agreement with Parametrix at a value not to exceed $200,000. During the meeting on Tuesday, Sept. 9, Colt told the council that through these two amendments, the department is looking to the future by purchasing an additional biodryer for the facility.

“You’ll notice there’s two amendments. One is for a net benefit and one is for a new add on. We did save some money on the liquid side of the phase,” Colt said. “We are spending a little more money on the solid side because we’re adding a second biodryer. We know in the next three or four years that we’ll add another biodryer because the project took so long. Let’s add it now so we don’t need another group to come back in three years to put it in.”

Colt added he’s presented the information about the additional biodryer to the Public Services Committee and City Attorney Brent Dille.

“If we can buy it now, get it in, install it at a minimal cost, versus in a couple years having to pay another firm to come in and install it, that’s what these two amendments are,” Colt said. “Over the course of the life of this project, we’re only about $300,000 off. $100,000 positive and $200,000 negative with over a $34 million project. We should be happy.”

On July 31, Colt told the Nisqually Valley News that the new facility can handle 2.5 million gallons of waste, while the old WRF was only able to process 600,000 gallons.

“The biggest thing is we’ve got a lot of room for growth,” Colt said in July. “We will never, ever have to touch this plant in our lifetime. No matter how fast Yelm continues to grow, this plant will handle that growth for probably the next 30 to 40 years. Even if you get growth, you could add more cassettes to create more flow.”

He believes Yelm’s population could grow to 30,000 to 40,000 residents before any action is needed to expand the plant. At the WRF, incoming sewage — directly from local sewer lines — will initially go through grit channels and headworks.

“When your toilet flushes, this is where it ends up,” Colt said. “It goes from here and goes into one of two filters so we can isolate it back and forth. That’s literally from people’s homes. If you flush it, this is where it comes.”

The facility currently doesn’t take any incoming solids due to septic tanks throughout city limits, but Colt said it will eventually add grinder pumps to handle those solid wastes. He anticipates the contents at the WRF to eventually “become chunkier.”