The Langdale ferry terminal has just been equipped with a new saltwater sewage treatment plant -the first of its kind in Canada.
The new plant, which sits at the top of the ferry terminal by the toll booths, boasts an advanced membrane process to treat the saltwater sewage coming from three ferries that frequent the Langdale terminal.
The new plant can treat 200 cubic metres of sewage a day and will replace internal sewage systems that used to be on board the Queen of Cowichan, Queen of Surrey and Queen of Coquitlam.
"What we've actually been doing around the fleet is changing to what we call sewage pump assure wherever we can, and that would be pumping into a municipal system," said B.C. Ferries media spokesperson Deborah Marshall. "The reason why we're doing that instead of discharging into the ocean is this way we would have a zero risk for a spill from the ship in case we had a problem with our sewage treatment plant on the ship. But with the location of our Langdale terminal, there isn't a municipal system nearby, so the most cost-effective strategy was to build a new wastewater treatment plant."
Marshall wouldn't release the total cost of the new plant, saying, "We wouldn't be disclosing that for competitive reasons with Corix."
The Corix group was hired to create the new plant and is comprised of a group of companies based in Vancouver that "specialize in products and utility solutions for sustainable infrastructure in the water, wastewater and energy sectors," according to their press release.
Jack Touhey, vice president, public and government affairs with Corix, said their portion of the project cost just over $1 million.
"We were the equipment supplier, designer, etc. working with the other engineering firm, the ferries engineering firm, but we did the full design and manufacturing of all the equipment at our plant in Langley," Touhey said.
The project took about six months from start to finish and has replaced a former sewage treatment plant that serviced the ferry terminal.
"We had one there before at Langdale that was treating just the terminal waste, but it didn't have the capacity to treat the vessels' sewage as well, plus it was nearing the end of its useful life. So we simply built another plant that can accommodate the terminal waste and the vessel sewage and treats it to a much higher standard than before," Marshall said.
She said the former onboard sewage treatment plants will now be decommissioned and holding tanks will be installed to keep the sewage onboard until vessels can dock at the Langdale terminal and pump to the new facility.
