Port Orange City Council 2008

I received the same call about the Police Department and the Fire Department. The architect states that the Police facility will meet LEED standards because of passive and some active things that were designed into the building. In the buildings current status, it will not meet the LEED highest certification but the architect does state that it will meet qualify for LEED certification. Because it appeared that the cost of construction would require the City to make substantial revisions to the buildings in order to get into the budget, there were certain trade offs made. For example, the Fire Stations have only 2 bays instead of 3. Also, we went to more passive energy savings rather than some of the more active ones. Fortunately, the cost of construction has come down and has allowed us to examine additional alternatives that were deleted or deferred. Our project managers are looking at solar technology now that we know exactly how much money we have remaining from the bond issue. It is our desire to place solar panels at all three locations to provide hot water and to be able to sell back any surplus energy to FPL. Also, we are examining whether any heat given off by the computer systems can be recycled and used as well. We have heard that is a potential source to reduce our energy usage. As you know, computers do give off a tremendous amount of heat. Now that the budget is set for the buildings, we can move from the passive LEED conservation techniques to the active LEED conservation techniques to make the facilities even more efficient.

I will ask about waterless toilets. I have been at some locations that had installed waterless toilets and they have replaced them with low volume toilets. It is not too late for us to install them in the buildings. I want to find out what are the advantages and disadvantages of these style toilets since I have noticed conversion back to low volume toilets at some locations.

As for your second question, the City of Port Orange operates a reclaim recovery pond in the central wellfield area. When there is excess reclaimed water, it is diverted to the pond rather than into the Halifax River. This time of year, we are not diverting much water to the reclaim water storage pond but rather are recovering stored water from the pond to supplement our reclaimed water since demand is often high during the months of March-June. As part of the City�s operating permit, St. Johns River Water Management District does require the City to place water into wetland areas to make sure that they are properly hydrated. This does not happen often since the natural systems work extremely well.

This past winter the capacity of the reclaim water storage pond was reached. The demand for reclaim water was low since many customers reduce their irrigation during the winter months. Rather than diverting the reclaim water to the Halifax River, we did hydrate wetlands. We have under construction an addition to the existing storage pond. It should be completed by the end of December. That will give us additional capacity for storage. Even with the additional storage capacity, there will be instances when we will hydrate wetlands. Our goal is to divert all of our reclaim water flow out of the Halifax River and when customers are not using all of the water it is our desire to store as much of it as possible for future use.

Since we brought the reclaim storage pond on line, we have noticed the number of complaints about low reclaimed water pressure has been tremendously reduced. Our operating crews continue to look for ways to be sure that residents have a reliable source of reclaim water to be used for irrigation purposes.

From an economic standpoint, it does not make sense to pump water on the ground unless it serves a specific purpose or permit requirement.

If you can provide us with more information and the time frame, we can provide more detailed information about the circumstances. My response is a general response based upon our operating practices and protocol.

Ken

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June 24, 2008 at 11:22 am

Thank you Mr. Parker for your response.

I will check into any information I can find regarding the allegation that water is wasted in the city's well field. I think a TV station had run that story, but perhaps I am incorrect that the City of Port Orange is included as being one of the city which dumps water into the soil.

I will get back to you and tell you what I know about this issue.

-- hank springer