Water tank relining expected to go ahead next month
Sep. 22—VERNON TOWNSHIP — The relining of a Meadville Area Water Authority (MAWA) water tower is expected to proceed in the next month or two with little impact on customers, according to authority officials.
Discussion of the two-week project provided a reminder of how adding a third tank could benefit authority operations, and officials expect to learn in November if a current grant application succeeds in obtaining funds for the construction of such a tank.
"The issue we have, with the two tanks we have," consulting engineer Tom Thompson told board members during their monthly meeting Wednesday, "when we want to do service, it's very difficult to keep the system operating the way it is now."
A third tower would enable the authority to take one of the two existing towers out of service for maintenance without significantly affecting system operations, according to Thompson.
If MAWA receives grant funding it has applied for through the H20 PA grant program of the Pennsylvania Department of Community and Economic Development, a third tower could be added as soon as summer 2024. The tank would be located between the existing towers on Limber Road and near H Street in the Hillcrest development. Thompson said no specific location has been determined.
With only two towers currently in operation, the authority must take significant steps to continue normal operations when maintenance is required on one of the tanks. Officials expected to hear this week from two contractors involved in an upcoming relining project at the Hillcrest tank regarding the timing of the work, which is expected to take place at some point in the next two months.
Two portable 25,000 gallon tanks will be used to provide storage capacity and regulate system pressure when the tower is taken out of service, according to Thompson.
Project manager Bob Harrington described the plan as the best option available but said "it's still not perfect." Where the pump station servicing the 360,000-gallon Hillcrest tower typically cycles off and on about every eight hours, that time will shrink to about every 15 minutes during the "very labor intensive" project, according to Harrington.
If all goes as planned, however, he said customers won't feel any impact from the project, which could take up to 15 days.
MAWA crews used a different strategy when they began a similar relining project a year ago at the Limber Road tower located just south of the intersection with Hamilton Road. Then, the authority purchased six "pop-off" pressure relief valves to be installed on hydrants in the area around the tank as pumps serving the area ran constantly during the work. The hydraulic modeling plan that identified where to install the pop-off valves, however, did not produce the anticipated results. In addition, the constant flow resulted in large amounts of water simply being wasted, according to Harrington.
The Limber Road project came about after inspection and cleaning of both tanks in 2021 revealed deficiencies in the interior tank lining. After the problems with the pop-off valve plan, the Limber Road project was postponed, and the authority has since switched its focus to the Hillcrest tank, where water seeping through a welded seam in the tank has become an issue, according to Harrington and Thompson.
The work will be performed by Portable Water Systems of Navarre, Ohio, which will provide the hydro-pneumatic tanks for water storage, and Liquid Engineering Corp. of Billings, Montana, which will clean and sandblast the tank interior, repair the leak, and reline the tank with a spray-on epoxy.
Board members in June approved a $19,655 contract with Portable Water Systems and a $113,302 contract with Liquid Engineering Corp.
Mike Crowley can be reached at (814) 724-6370 or by email at mcrowley@meadvilletribune.com.
