Evaluation of a Publicly Owned Treatment Works to Accept New Loading from an Existing Industrial User

The Berkeley County Public Service Sewer District operates a publicly owned treatment works (POTW) in Martinsburg, West Virginia. The POTW accepts wastewater from residents and various industrial users; treating the combined wastewater through sequencing batch reactors and other supporting unit processes. The POTW is regulated by a West Virginia Department of Environmental Protection permit that includes an industrial pretreatment program allocating loads to industrial users (IUs). This permit limits industrial loading to the POTW to below the plant’s capacity, reserving capacity for future development. When one IU requested an increase to its allocated loading, Geosyntec used the biological modeling software GPS-X and other calculations to evaluate the impact the additional wastewater load might have on the existing POTW system operation. The results of the analysis were used to modify the industrial pretreatment permit and allow the POTW to accept additional loading from the IU.