Bucyrus, Ohio

Engineer: Burgess & Niple Permitted Plant Flow: 6.0 MGD Installation Date: Winter 2000

The City of Bucyrus, owns and operates the wastewater treatment facility that discharges tertiary-treated wastewater to the Sandusky River.

The wastewater plant was originally constructed in 1939 and consisted of the administration building, influent pumping, primary and secondary treatment facilities, and anaerobic digesters. In 1961, a new influent pump building, aerated grit tank, primary settling tank, aeration tank, and digester were added. Plant capacity was increased again in 1988 with the addition of a fourth primary tank and aeration tank, two new final settling tanks, and the tertiary filter facility. The most recent improvement project in 2000 included the addition of a Belt Filter Press and a RDP EnVessel Pasteurization System that produces a marketable Class A product for use by local farmers. The product may be immediately loaded onto trucks for agricultural use or accumulated on-site in a covered storage area.

Prior to making the change to a Class A process the City was facing a significant cost increase to $45 per ton to dispose of dewatered cake at a local landfill. Now the City is returning a valuable product to the earth at 1/3rd the cost of landfilling.

Storage building in foreground and the Belt Filter Press/Pasteurization building in the background.

The aerated sludge holding tank insures more consistent feed solids and “fresh” sludge to the Belt Filter Press.

The inclined sludge cake screw conveyor moves the 19-20% BFP cake to the inlet point on the ThermoBlender.

The screw conveyor intermediate discharge point provides a simple method of bypassing the Pasteurization System.

A farmer is loading his own dump truck using the City’s bucket loader.

The Class A product is friable and is uniformly spread on farm ground with a traditional rear discharge manure spreader at agronomic loading rates of 2-3 dry tons per acre.

At the farmer’s option, the City will deliver product to the farmer’s field for a nominal fee.