Solving Clyde Street's smelly water could come with stinky price tag

ELORA ‒ It will cost approximately $400,000 to solve the smelly water problem on Clyde Street, near O'Brien Park. 

In a new report coming to council on Wednesday, staff are recommending the approval of a single source contract award to Environmental & Power Solutions Inc. (EPS) for the engineering design, installation and commissioning of an odour control system for the Clyde Street Wastewater Pumping Station (WWPS) in Elora where the township has "historically" received odour complaints related to the station from residents and users of O'Brien Park. 

In November 2020, EPS carried out an odour assessment on Clyde Street WWPS which concluded high levels of hydrogen sulfide and volatile organic compounds both on the main floor and the basement of the pumping station, with the greater concentrations occurring in the basement, were contributing to the odour. 

"Environmental & Power Solutions Inc. was able to successfully demonstrate through the pilot process that odours from the Clyde Street WWPS could be effectively reduced using their proprietary modular odour control system, without significant building modifications or expansion," said water and wastewater capital manager Ryan Maiden, in the report. "Their system provided advantages to operational demands from staff and had a lower life cycle cost (which) makes them uniquely qualified to complete the required works." 

The project will cost $384,507 including non-rebate HST and $1,500 from the Wastewater Capital Reserve to fund the anticipated overages. 

Originally appearing in the 2022 budget with a funding amount of $75,000, a budget top-up of $390,000 was granted in 2023 to facilitate the project's completion.

The full report is available here. 

Isabel Buckmaster is the Local Journalism Initiative reporter for GuelphToday. LJI is a federally-funded program