It has been announced that design proposals for the Millstreet Wastewater Treatment Plant upgrade have been approved at Government level, and that Cork County Council will now proceed with preparing contract documents with a view to seeking tenders as soon as possible. The contract is estimated at a cost of €4.1, and it is expected that it will make the Millstreet plant compliant with the Urban Wastewater Treatment Directive.
The upgrade was called for in a 2010 survey on all urban treatment plants in the country. The following measures needed to be completed:
- Increase capacity of treatment plant (2015+)
- Provide tertiary treatment or relocate outfall (2015+)
- Provide nutrient removal or relocate outfall
Story is from CorkPolitics.ie (site no longer exists)
Links:
Waste Water Upgrade Welcomed – Cork North West Fine Gael TD, Áine Collins has welcomed the approval given by the Minister for the Environment, Community and Local Government, Phil Hogan TD, for Cork County Council’s design proposals for the Millstreet Wastewater Treatment Plant Upgrade. The Council will proceed with preparing the contract documents with a view to seeking tenders as soon as possible… (the Corkman 1st Aug 2013)
Yesterday, the EPA yesterday published its annual report “Focus on Urban Waste Water Treatment in 2013” which among other things, outlined that 38 waste water treatment plants in Ireland that still fail to meet the minimum treatment standards. Unfortunately Millstreet is amongst them. It has this on Millstreet
So what the extract above is saying is that it’s sized for 1600 people while there’s waste water from 2252 people feeding into it. So basically it’s likely that the waste water isn’t staying in the plant long enough and is probably not fully treated by the time it is released.
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In 2008 an EPA Report (page 8), it states that the Millstreet plant was due to commence upgrading works in 2009 at a cost of €1,628,000. This obviously didn’t happen … the recession probably put a stop to it.
Since February 2014 Irish Water now have the contract to maintain the plant.
The Irish Water Capital Investment Plan from Sept 30th 2014 has the status of the Millstreet plant as:
So, initially fingered to start in 2009, design plans were approved in July 2013 (from the article above), but still no work on the ground has commenced, and in the RTÉ News today, a spokesman says that the infrastructure will be brought up to standard incrementally in the next seven years. We’re normally last to get things done around here, so i wouldn’t hold my breath.
But hopefully the job will be completed sooner rather than later by Irish Water, and not left undersized and underresourced as it was with Cork County Council for many decades.
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The topic has been well covered in most of the Media today, all saying pretty much the same thing: Irish Independent, theJournal.ie, Irish Examiner, RTE News (video), Irish Times
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The report is very interesting in that it gives a scale of the enormous amount of work that needs to be done, and how so many treatment plants were not kept to the required standards for decades.
Alternatively, you could read the summary which are in the Key Findings of the EPA Report