Wastewater Treatment and Biosolids Management Master Plan

Hello! Sorry for the delay in this response. 

The City’s sewer use bylaw does not permit the use of garburators. Organic material should be placed in the green bins for further processing at the Waste Resource Innovation Centre.  https://guelph.ca/living/environment/garbage-and-recycling/

Newspaper advertisements have been used to notify the public of Project Initiation and both Public Open Houses and will be used to notify the public of Project Completion. Our engagement efforts have been impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic and have been offered entirely online however our project team is happy to provide informaiton and have discussion with members of the public who do not have access to, or comfort with, computers.

Microplastic removal with ferrofluids/magnets was not investigated as part of this Master Plan, as the focus for wastewater treatment technologies was on those that have full-scale installations at municipal wastewater treatment plants. However, if this technology becomes more prevalent in wastewater treatment in the future, it could be investigated during future Master Plan updates.

Energy efficiency and greenhouse gas generation projections were developed for each alternative and considered in the evaluation. Alternatives that are more energy efficient and minimize greenhouse gas emissions receive higher scores. We are proud to let the peope in Guelph know that some components of the preferred solution are projected to have a net positive impact on greenhouse gas emissions in the City.

Regarding First Nations engagement, the team has been engaged with impacted Indigenous and First Nations communities throughout the project, as required for the Class EA process. The City is in the process of building relationships with First Nations and Indigenous groups with the goal of conducting meaningful engagement on projects such as this one.

Our question was intended to get feedback about how the process was for you as a participant. We appreciate that you might want to know more about our engagement analytics too. This information will be presented in the public open house report, as part of the Master Plan. The report provides detailed information on the number of people who visited the web page and who completed the survey. All responses to comments are located on www.haveyoursay.guelph.ca.

Environmental impacts will be clearly outlined in the Master Plan report, which will be available for public review.

The Guelph WWTP currently has 4 anaerobic digesters onsite that are used for sludge stabilization, producing biosolids. The odour control facility is mainly to mitigate any potential odours from the new integrated primary sludge and WAS thickening facility and from the new dewatering facility.

Thank you for the feedback. That is one of our favourite episodes of Magic School Bus. We will work to make future materials as clear as possible. If you have any questions, please reach out to the project team for further discussion.

Thank you for this feedback. To be clear, biosolids storage was selected to provide operational flexibility at the Guelph WWTP during the winter months when land application of the Lystek product is not possible. Odour control was included as a component to mitigate any potential odour impacts from the new solids handling.