The Saginaw Water Works
On September 29, 1929 the Saginaw Water Treatment Plant began treating Saginaw River water. The building is noted for its Architectural Design and Artwork. On October 19, 1948 Lake Huron water began flowing from the pumping station, although it took nearly two days for the water to reach the water plant. At this time, a single pipeline owned by the Saginaw-Saginaw Water Supply Corporation supplied the water plant, with booster pump stations along the route.
The original design capacity of the plant was 30 million gallons a day (MGD). As the population of Saginaw increased and new industries were added, an increase in the capacity was needed. During the 1960’s several projects were completed in order to accomplish this. The first project was the 1964 construction of a second 10 million gallon finished water reservoir. Secondly, the plant originally had twelve rapid sand filters that limited the capacity to 30 MGD. In 1967 construction began on adding six more filters that would increase the capacity to 45 MGD. The extension of the filter gallery was completed in 1968, duplicating as near as possible the original structure. This involved getting identical Italian green serpentine marble and polished black marble from Belgium for the massive filter operating tables. The outside stone and brick were matched as well.
In order to pump the finished water into the distribution system the plant uses split case centrifugal pumps. Originally there were five pumps for a maximum capacity of 48 MGD. In 1969 two more pumps, larger than any of the original pumps, increased the maximum capacity to 80 MGD. Another pump was added in 1959 and a final pump in 1978, for a total of nine high service pumps and a maximum pumping capacity of 107 MGD. There are piping connections in place to add a tenth pump.
The plant receives power from two main power lines and electrical switchgear. Also the plant has two diesel generators that can power the entire plant in the event of a complete power outage. The main electrical switchgear and all the motor controllers for the pumps and house loads were upgraded in 1969. The original Fulton diesel generators were replaced in 1979.
Plans were then made to construct a raw water reservoir with provisions to construct a new water treatment plant. In 1979 two ninety million gallons reservoirs were constructed with a pumping structure. In the event of a failure of the transmission line the reservoirs provided a large raw water supply to allow time for the transmission main to be repaired. By 1995 a second parallel transmission line had been completed from the intake to the main booster pumping station.
From the 1980’s many projects have been focused on maintaining the building and the equipment used to treat and deliver water to our customers. Some of the notable improvements have been adding a vehicle storage garage, removing asbestos from the building, adding a filter surface wash system, replacing windows, exterior building restoration, interior building restoration and roofing material replacement. The most recent projects were sandblasting and repainting all the main process piping and the addition of a fortified decorative fence in the front of the building.
Upcoming improvements include a chemical feed upgrade to improve safety and further security improvements.