Operations Report February 2016

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Water usage

  • Pumped 327,000
  • Backwashes 32,480
  • Net pumped 294,520
  • Source meter 285,720
  • Flushing 5,000
  • Net to distribution 280,720
  • Residential meters 212,270
  • Unaccounted for water 68,450
  • Percentage of loss 24%

We have still done nothing about the flat tire. We are running on the spare.

Mark Henderson from Washington State Department of Ecology came out and completed an inspection. There isn’t anything to inspect but he did ask that we change our reporting procedure slightly. We now identify the days and the volume of our backwash for every day, and the number of backwashes. The more interesting part was the discussion concerning dechlorination of backwash water. The limits of allowable chlorine in backwash are being reduced every year. The good news is it shouldn’t be too difficult to put in a unit. Mark is sending me further information.

We had a small problem with water meters. A resident decided to wash his car with the neighbor’s hose. Unfortunately the owner of the hose is an absent owner who is in Arizona for the winter. Oops. He had his meter shut off but the shut off key was right there. We put a lock on the meter for the owner of the hose. Luckily the offending resident who is a renter moved out so we are not expecting any further problems.

The backhoe repair is growing. The mechanic showed me where the master cylinder and the two slave cylinders are leaking, which was the primary cause of out trouble in the first place. We are changing to have Pape do the repair work on the backhoe instead of the company in Lynden. The cost is about the same and the service is excellent.

We are still having trouble with the final turbidity. The trouble is not significant. It is more fine tuning. I have had the engineer from Wilson Engineering out (this engineer is a recent addition to Wilson Engineering and came from Tacoma water system and knows filtration. Also I have the Hach representative here to look at the turbidity meters. So far nothing. It is looking as if we have too clean of water to start with and second we don’t use enough water in the winter months. It’s a good problem to have to work on.

We received our Water Quality Monitoring Schedule for 2016 and the requirements for this year are less than we budgeted for 2016. I am suggesting we conduct additional tests even though they are not called for by the state for this year