A special ceremonial groundbreaking event for the new Northwest Water Treatment Facility took place on Thursday, October 22, 2020. Shovels broke ground at 21st and Hoover, the future home to the new water treatment plant. Representatives from the City, Wichita Water Partners, the Kansas Department of Health and Environment, and the Environmental Protection Agency were onsite to speak about the project

Development for the new Northwest Water Treatment Plant will include an Evergy substation, critical to the operation of the new northwest water treatment plant. The substation will be located south of 13th Street, between Scouller Street and Spinnaker Coves Lake, will be approximately 295’ x 185’ in size and feature an aesthetic surrounding brick wall with landscaping. Construction began in March of 2022 and should conclude in March of 2023. Power lines connecting to the Water Treatment Plant will run underground and not affect Sedgwick County Park. 

A safe and quality water system is a vital part of Wichita's infrastructure, serving up to 550,000 people across Wichita and surrounding communities. Our current water treatment facility is 80 years old and is in need of replacement. This new treatment facility will be state-of-the-art and serve residents for generations to come.

The facility will be sized to meet peak hourly demand with the ability to treat up to 120 million gallons of water each day. To put that into context, our peak daily demand in the most recent years has been less than 85 million gallons a day with the average demand at approximately 50 million gallons a day.

It would be built with fully redundant treatment systems to ensure that no generation, now or in the future, will experience a water outage due to operational issues.

The City of Wichita entered into a contract with Wichita Water Partners on February 12, 2019 to complete the first phase of the project, which includes developing a 30% project design, finalizing the maximum price and preparing loan applications.

Under the current project schedule, the new water treatment facility is expected to be operational by the end of 2024.

The new water treatment facility will be built near 21st N and Hoover, directly northeast of the Sedgwick County Zoo.

Most of the treatment plant would not be visible from nearby streets. During construction, steps will be taken to minimize the impact to the surrounding area. The Design Council and Oversight Steering Committee are also providing guidance on aesthetics to ensure the new plant would fit well into the surrounding community.

The Oversight Steering Committee has had several planning meetings and the first public meeting will be on October 11, 2019, to discuss the current status of the project. The City will submit its application for WIFIA financing by October 30, 2019.

According to the project timeline, dirt work is expected to begin in early 2020. The official groundbreaking would occur late 2020, following environmental permitting.

Under the current project schedule, the new water treatment facility is expected to be operational by the end of 2024.

Our primary focus is on designing and building the new water treatment facility. After the new facility is built and serving our community, the City will determine if and how the old plant be utilized. It could be decommissioned, or some additional investment could be made in the future to keep it as a backup facility.

• Andover
• Bel Aire
• Benton
• Derby
• Kechi
• Park City
• Rose Hill
• Valley Center
• Sedgwick Rural Water District #1
• Sedgwick Rural Water District #3
• Butler Rural Water District #5
  

As voted on and approved by City Council on February 12, 2019, Wichita Water Partners is under contract with the City of Wichita for Phase 1 of the Northwest Wichita Water Facility (NWWF) design-build project. Phase 1 includes developing the 30% design and providing a guaranteed maximum price for the design and construction of the facility. Through Phase 1, Wichita Water Partners has been on time, on scope and under budget.

During the NWWF Oversight Steering Committee meeting on November 19, Staff will present recommendations for the completion of Phase 2. Following that meeting, City Council will review the project and staff's recommendations during a workshop on November 26 before a City Council vote on December 3 on the final delivery model.

There is a staff of on-site technical experts continuously monitoring equipment performance and asset condition in order to avoid repairs that could disrupt the treatment process. The City maintains a contingency fund reserved for repairs and keeps duplicate parts on hand to ensure repairs can be made immediately.

The City also has an Emergency Water Plan which includes:

• A list of vendors who are ready to respond 24/7 with specialized equipment
• An emergency water supply in underground storage that can be used while repairs are made.

At the Cheney Reservoir Pump Station there are strainers that separate larger debris, such as mussel shells, from the water between the intake and the pumps. These strainers were recently replaced. The new strainers remove anything larger than 1/8" to a solids debris waste. The new strainers are also a type that will not grind and pass some debris like previous versions appeared to be doing. In the very rare instance that debris passes through the strainers, it will be captured in the lime residuals and removed with the waste stream.

Through engineering optimization, the project team was able to achieve a design modification that incorporates a deeper solids contact clarifier which will be less costly and less difficult to maintain. The revised design allows for rating of each clarifier at 24.86 MGD rather than the initial 20.72 MGD while providing the same or better treatment.

Backwashing via pumps and/or elevated towers are common methods of providing backwash water to the type of filters proposed. The concept design started with pumps for direct backwash water supply due in part to the time and cost for maintenance of pumps vs pumps plus elevated towers plus flow control. During design it was thought that the capital cost of elevated storage with lower horsepower pumps would be less than direct pumping. Costing of the project found the direct pumping for backwash to be a lower capital cost. Direct backwash pumping allows for a lower capital cost, a lower maintenance cost and the pumps may be dual purposed for finished water pumping.

Capacity and efficiency have been a central focus of the design process. The project scope meets all of the City's objectives for the new treatment plant, including:

• Full redundancy: Any asset within the new treatment facility can go out of service and the facility can continue producing the full capacity of 120 million gallons per day. Our peak demand in recent years has been less than 85 million gallons per day. Therefore, this facility is designed to meet demand now and into the future.
• Source flexibility: Any blend of water source can be treated at the new treatment facility, which not only adds efficiency, but drought resiliency as well. The current treatment plant lacks the ability to treat a single source and therefore can only treat a blend of Cheney Reservoir and Equus Bed water.
• Water quality: The new treatment facility will meet and exceed all current water quality standards. It has been designed to accomodate potential future water quality needs by preserving the ability to transition to biologically active filters.
  

The City is working to secure two types of loans (state and federal) which are awarded to public water supply projects and provide significant cost savings. If granted, the two loans are expected to save $76 million, keep the rate increases lower and may help complete the project earlier than if the City had to rely on other financing options. The loans are offered by:

• The Environmental Protection Agency's Water Infrastructure Finance and Innovation Act (WIFIA)
• Kansas' State Revolving Loan Fund

2020 combined water and sewer rates will increase 5% for 2020. Customer bills will vary depending on the volume of water used, with hopes it will encourage water conservation. To help avoid the impact on people's water bills the city opted to use a mix of federal and state loans to keep rates at a minimum. Residential customers will likely experience a monthly increase of $2 to $7 depending on how much water is used. Commercial customers, on average, may see an increase of around $28 per month, and industrial customers, on average, may see an increase of about $2,600.

It is important to remember that the City has been diligient about minimizing the impact to ratepayers. The current proposal calls for rate increases to be spread out over time to ensure customers who benefit from future improvements will be the ones who pay for them.

• Designing and building a new water treatment facility is a large and complex investment in Wichita's infrastructure that will serve future generations.
• The City is focused on delivering a state-of-the-art facility at the best possible value to ratepayers.
• The City submitted its WIFIA application on 10/29/19, a key milestone toward achieving a water-secure future for Wichita.
• Wichita is only one of 39 communities invited to participate in the WIFIA application, recognizing the quality of the city's planning efforts.
• WIFIA financing is advantageous to ratepayers as it is the only low-interest loan program available that allows debt payments to be deferred until five years after construction is completed.
• This unique repayment plan allows for rate increases to be much more gradual to support the project.

Wichita Water Partners is a joint venture led by Burns & McDonnell, an internationally recognized engineering firm, and Alberici Construction, a renowned North American construction company. Burns & McDonnell and Alberici have subcontracted local firms for the project, including

• GLMV
• Schaefer Johnson Cox Frey Architecture
• MKEC
• Professional Engineering Consultants
• Wildcat Construction
• UCI
• Dondlinger Construction
• HDR
• Greteman Group
• DuBois Consultants
• Dudley Williams & Associates

At the beginning of this process, the City engaged Garver Engineering as an owner's representative.

As the City's owner's representative, Garver is responsible for project oversight, which includes review and evaluation of services provided by Wichita Water Partners, cost and schedule reviews, design reviews, and negotiation of certain aspects of the guaranteed maximum price and contract. Garver works alongside City staff to ensure that key project details are not overlooked.

The substation will be located south of 13th Street, between Scouller Street and Spinnaker Coves Lake. The location was chosen by the water treatment facility project steering committee.

The substation is needed to supply power to the City of Wichita’s new water treatment facility.

The substation will be surrounded by a decorative stone wall and utilize two steel power poles an average of 75 feet tall.

The substation will follow a similar design as Evergy’s existing substation located near 47th Street South and Webb Road.

Substation transformers emit some noise. The stone wall will help buffer sound.

The substation will have security lighting that can be turned on and off as needed.

Once the substation is operational, Evergy will perform preventative maintenance once a month during normal business hours. Evergy will access the substation for equipment upgrades or unplanned maintenance as needed.

No further easements or land acquisition are anticipated.

Construction is scheduled to begin in March 2021 and be completed in 18 – 24 months.

Evergy will design and construct the substation using both Evergy resources and subcontractors depending on the task. Evergy will provide project management services and coordination during construction of the project.

Evergy will maintain the substation, including landscaping inside and directly outside the stone wall.

The substation will be funded by the City of Wichita’s water treatment facility project.