Alan Dickens, Brunswick Heads
To date (10/07/2021), the inflow into Brunswick Waste Water Treatment Plant has been 1,056,459.53 kilolitres, recycled water is 50,315.34 kilolitres, treated effluent leaving the plant is 1,094,160.08 kilolitres. These figures make no sense, even with 50,315.34 kilolitres going to recycled water there is more treated effluent leaving the plant than is entering the plant – how is this possible?
The Ocean Shores STP closure seems to have been decided; this will remove the opportunity of the northernmost communities of Byron Shire probably ever having access to recycled water.
What a failure in planning this is, Ocean Shores STP has been left untouched since the 1995 augmentation of the original Ocean Shores STP. No interim upgrades have been done to date.
The only change in the process is bizarre, this change is the treated effluent leaving the plant, which flows through the UV Disinfection Plant then through a Serpentine Channel, and is now pumped back up as it leaves the Serpentine Channel to the UV Disinfection Plant, to go through again rather than flowing to the river.
Surely this indicates that the treated effluent is being contaminated by the Serpentine Channel, the downside of this is that the unscreened treated effluent being pumped back the UV Disinfection Plant will contaminate it and cause its efficiency to drop and require it to be taken offline and cleaned out.
There is an alternative that is available and has been available for years. The original tertiary pond from the original O/S plant has been sitting in close proximity to the UV Disinfection plant, totally empty, why has this not been taken advantage of and put back online?
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