Maine Water Co. outlines 2017 capital plan
photo/TIM GREENWAY
Judy Wallingford, president of Maine Water, in the filter building at the drinking water treatment facility in Saco
Maine Water Co., which serves 32,000 customers, or a population of 100,000, in over 20 communities throughout the state, plans to invest $8.7 million next year to continue replacing aging infrastructure.
The Saco-based water utility, which is owned by Connecticut Water Service Inc., reported almost $5 million of that capital spending is designated for aging water mains and other components in the distribution systems that it maintains.
Maine Water also budgeted almost $2 million in 2017 for the design and permitting of a new water treatment facility in Biddeford on the Saco River, the company stated in a release announcing its capital investment plans.
The current treatment facility is on the floodplain of the Saco River and was built more than 130 years ago in 1884. The new facility will be built on a parcel of land recently acquired on South Street that is well out of the river’s flood plain. It will be a state-of-the-art facility, energy and process efficient and will have expandable capacity to serve the growing Southern Maine region.
“Proactively replacing infrastructure improves reliability and water quality, and reduces lost water through leaks and breaks,” said Judy Wallingford, Maine Water’s president, in a statement accompanying the capital plan. “We’ll make sure to coordinate this work closely with road work and wastewater system upgrades in the municipalities we serve. Shared economies of scale can save the towns’ taxpayers, and the water company’s customers, on paving and other construction costs.”
Playing catch-up with aging infrastructure
Maine Water’s capital investment plan for 2017 is more than $1 million more than what the company spent this year, when it invested $7.4 million to improve service, water quality and reliability across its 10 divisions in the state. The 2016 capital improvement program included almost $5 million in upgrading old water mains and other related infrastructure, some dating back to the late 1800s.
Even so, Wallingford cited the recent report of the Maine chapter of the American Society of Civil Engineers on the condition of infrastructure across all sectors in Maine, which gave the state a grade of C+ for the infrastructure of all water utilities in the state, both municipal and privately owned.
“That reflects the advanced age of water systems throughout the northeast United States. Good infrastructure supports our communities, so we are committed to making these investments,” Wallingford said. “We are adding construction jobs as our work is under way, and upgrading these public water systems to support the future needs of the communities, including public health, safety and economic development and the wise use of our natural water resources.”
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