Bonnyville’s main water transmission line to be flushed

Flushing of the Town of Bonnyville’s main water transmission line will continue Tuesday morning.

The Town put out a notice on Monday afternoon that described how the regional waterline project bringing Cold Lake water to Bonnyville is progressing in the final steps after delays in the final commissioning in December.

The flushing will last a maximum of 10 days until January 15.

“So flushing will take place for up to 10 days and that’s done at 170 liters per second, so it’s quite a bit of water anyways,” said Greg Sawchuk, chair of the Bonnyville Regional Water Commission.

“The landowners along the [transmission] route will see site vehicles along the pipeline because they are doing sampling. They’re sampling again for turbidity to make sure that the water ends up clear.”

The Town said that residents may notice water in the ditches near the flushing locations and should not be concerned.

The reason for the break in December, Sawchuk said, was that earlier attempts at flushing the line with the new water showed turbidity, which is the measure of particulates in the water and makes the water look murky.

“If it sits for any period of time, and then you apply the pressure and start to run stuff through it, well, all of a sudden stuff that never broke loose before breaks loose and you get this turbidity and that was the issue before Christmas,” he said.

The regional water system will be disinfected with chloramination versus the current disinfection of chlorination that takes place at Bonnyville’s water treatment plant.

The total project cost is roughly $94 million with the Town paying just over 10 per cent of the cost.

The Town said they will inform residents when the final changeover is set.