Bare Point Water Treatment
by Scott A.Sumner
Thunder Bay Business
Some 150 people attended the ceremonial turning on of the new Bare Point Water Treatment Plant. On a beautiful day with the Sleeping Giant looking on dignatories turned on the tap and drank some crystal clear water in unison.
This is truly a monumental event for Thunder Bay. We will not see as big a project in Thunder Bay again in our lifetime. Drinking water is one of the biggest issues in a municipality and as a community we are excellent shape with the newest water treatment plant in the world
with 25 million gallons per day possible, noted Lynn Peterson, Mayor of Thunder Bay. We are also protecting one of our greatest assets- Lake Superior by using almost no chemicals in our treatment system to provide an excellent water for our community. Doug Scott, the late City Engineer was instrumental in the Water Treatment Plant and the Doug Scott Memorial Boardroom is at the new plant. The current manager of city engineering acknowledged all the
city employees who worked on the water rationalization program. There was tours of the impressive $94 million operation which included the control headquarters of the whole operation.
We monitor all the systems and can control pumps in the reservoirs through out the city etc. The data is all recorded with state of the art controls. All of our pumps are on generator back up systems in case of hydro outage. In the daytime we have 10 to 12 people while at 6pm we
have 1 person, stated a city employee. First the water comes from a holding area and enters one of five trays where the water is brought through a membrane. There are 570 modules in a tray. The bacteria is 4 times less in size than 1 micron. 5 million gallons per tray makes for
a 25 million per day capacity. This is the most modern technology in use in the world today. We have a good stock pile of water on site at all times.
