The City Council Monday hired a Peoria engineering firm to design and oversee a project to lessen how much of a pollutant the city discharges into a creek.
The pollutant, called chlorides, is a threat to aquatic life in the creek, according to the Illinois Environmental Protection Agency (IEPA).
IEPA officials for years have advised city officials that the level of chlorides discharged from Kewanee’s wastewater treatment plant exceeds the state’s limit.
Scott DeSplinter, representing the Peoria engineering firm of Crawford, Murphy and Tilly, was at Monday’s City Council meeting to answer questions.
The engineering firm is to be paid $290,000 for its work on the project.
DeSplinter said the plan is to drill two 770-foot wells, one at the Wethersfield well site and the other at the site on Madison Avenue.
Those wells would be much shallower than the city’s main wells, which go down more than 2,000 feet. The hope is that the water from the shallower wells will contain less chloride than the deeper wells.
That “cleaner” water would be sent to the treatment plant to be added to the discharge. The hope is that this would lower the chloride to an acceptable level.
Mayor Gary Moore asked DeSplinter what tests there will be to make sure this approach does the job.
DeSplinter replied that test wells will be drilled first at each site, so that chloride levels in the shallower water can be determined.
If the levels aren’t low enough, “Then we go to the drawing board,” he said.
DeSplinter has said the city can apply for a low-interest loan to pay for the project. There is even a chance that the state will “forgive” at least part of the loan, so that the city wouldn’t have to pay it back.
The project is to be completed by next summer.
At its last meeting, the council voted to raise water rates charged to Kewanee consumers, and the chloride project was cited as one of the reasons for the increase.
