Water & Wastewater Project

Dahlonega Wastewater Plant Renovations

Dahlonega, GA

The wastewater treatment facility in Dahlonega had outgrown its capacity to serve its community, and has also started receiving repeated violations for both phosphorus and ammonia nitrogen discharge limits. Dahlonega sought the services of WK Dickson to help update their treatment facility equipment and operations and locate ways to bring them into compliance with nutrient discharge limits. The result of the project made the treatment plant compliant with the consent order ahead of schedule, and also made the plant more efficient by reducing the operational costs by 25%, thereby saving the city thousands of dollars annually.

Project Details

WK Dickson provided engineering design, permitting, and construction oversight for improvements to this 1.4 MGD plant. Both existing sequencing batch reactor (SBR) biological systems were upgraded, including the replacement of the coarse bubble aeration system with a new fine bubble aeration system. The dissolved oxygen control system was inoperable, so variable speed drives were added to new blowers and the SBR controls were upgraded. This allowed for blower operation to automatically modulate based upon dissolved oxygen levels in the SBR. Two submersible mixers were added within the existing post equalization tank and the chemical feed piping was relocated, increasing reaction and flocculation time. These upgrades substantially increased operator flexibility and significantly improved ammonia and biological phosphorus removal in that phase of the treatment process. Following development of preliminary cost projections, the corrective action plan included improvements to the aeration system, the SBR system, effluent filters, UV system, biosolids system, and the chemical feed system.