On Saturday, April 7th 2018, members of the PEO Simcoe-Muskoka Chapter attended tours of the Barrie Surface Water Treatment Plant and the Barrie Wastewater Treatment Facility. During these tours, the attendees were able to get an inside look at the process of getting water to and from homes/businesses in the Barrie area. Shane Steele (Surface Water Supply Operator IV) gave an in depth tour of the facility, explaining in great detail the process by which surface water is collected from Kempenfelt Bay, pumped to the plant via. the low lift pumping station, treated via. flocculation, screened and filtered through a series of membrane and carbon filters. What was most impressive about this tour was the level of innovative automation technology that allows the plant to run seamlessly. Following the tour of the SWTP, Dane Reynolds (Optimization Analyst) from the Wastewater Treatment Facility gave a detailed technical tour of what happens when the water supplied from the SWTP enters the drainage system. Members had the opportunity to walk around the plant and learn about the primary, secondary, and tertiary treatment processes including the raw sewage pumps, fine grinders, grit tanks, primary clarifiers, selector tanks, HPOX/UNOX tanks, rotating biological contactors, sand filters, and UV treatment. Members all had the unique opportunity of viewing the activated sludge from the secondary treatment process under the microscope at the end of the tour!
The Chapter would like to extend a special thank you to Shane Steele, Dane Reynold and Charles Maureci for hosting our membership and for their continuing efforts to making Barrie a sustainable place to live, use clean water, and swim in the Bay!
To the membership that participated in the tour, thank you for contributing to the PEO scholarship fund with$200.00 contributed!