116 3rd St SE
Cedar Rapids, Iowa 52401
Cedar Rapids one of few cities not requiring industries to pretreat wastewater
‘They can send raw industrial-strength waste right down the pipeline’
CEDAR RAPIDS — Cedar Rapids treats more waste in its wastewater than a city the size of Phoenix, a booming metropolis of nearly 1.7 million people.
That’s because the city of Cedar Rapids doesn’t require large companies, such as manufacturing plants and food processors, to pretreat their industrial wastewater. This system — popular with companies because they don’t have to maintain their own treatment facilities — is unique in Iowa and unusual for mid-size cities across the United States.
“As long as they meet our standards, they can send raw industrial-strength waste right down the pipeline to our plant and have it taken care of,” Cedar Rapids Utilities Director Roy Hesemann told The Gazette Editorial Board in April. “There are very few facilities in the country that offer that.”
The Cedar Rapids City Council last week approved a $277 million project to upgrade the Water Pollution Control Facility, which treats wastewater from Cedar Rapids, Marion, Hiawatha, Robins, Palo and some of Linn County.
This wastewater stream comes from about 190,000 people, but the amount of organic material in the waste stream make it “equivalent to treating a city the size of 1.8 million,” Hesemann said in a May 17 interview.
Wastewater treatment upgrades, expected to be completed in 2029, will allow the city to continue to meet federal permit limits for ammonia, nitrogen and phosphorus, among other contaminants, discharged to the Cedar River, Hesemann said.
Most cities can’t handle untreated wastewater
Most Iowa cities require large industrial customers to pretreat wastewater before sending it down the sewer line. Untreated wastewater may damage city infrastructure, said Bob Milroy, director of the Regional Water Reclamation Facility in Clinton.
“One industry sent us some stuff that killed all our bugs in the treatment plant,” said Milroy, referring to the bacteria and microorganisms used to break down waste at water treatment plants. “Even pH (acidity), if it’s too high, will cause corrosion in the collection system.”
The Clinton plant takes wastewater from Clinton, Camanche and Low Moor, all cities in Clinton County. The plant issues industrial customers a discharge limit and the companies must pretreat the waste to those levels or face a fine of up to $1,000 per violation.
“Every industry is different,” Milroy said.
While some customers focus on removing metals from their wastewater — a federal requirement — others, like Nestle Purina, a dog food manufacturer in Clinton, also remove fats, oils and grease from their wastewater before sending it to the Reclamation Facility, he said.
Because Cedar Rapids doesn’t require industrial customers to pretreat wastewater, the firms don’t have to spend money — an estimated $30 to $50 million per industry — to build their own pretreatment facilities, Hesemann said.
“They’re not having to reinvest in capital equipment and processes, hire staff to monitor it and operate it or have the maintenance expense to take care of it,” he said. For the city to do all these things for large companies “it really becomes an economy of scale.”
Extra fees paid by large users help keep rates low
There are eight large industries in Cedar Rapids the city bills for extra organic material included with wastewater. Hesemann would not say which companies are on the list.
ADM, which has grain-processing plants in Cedar Rapids and Clinton, recently agreed to pay more than $100 million so the Clinton facility could upgrade its treatment processes to take all ADM wastewater without pretreatment, Milroy said.
“It will ultimately lower our rates for all the citizens and provide some money for us to do infrastructure projects we didn’t have money to do,” Milroy said.
Google is considering building a data center northwest of The Eastern Iowa Airport in Cedar Rapids. Data centers use large amounts of treated water to cool computer servers. Wastewater would need to be cooled before it goes back to the river because warm water can harm wildlife.
“I’m not too concerned about the data center in terms of heat,” Hesemann said. “We think they are putting in cooling towers.”
Accepting largely untreated wastewater from large industrial customers does not raise rates for other customers, including homeowners, Hesemann said.
The city’s 2024 rates are $43.93 per centum cubic feet (CCF), which is equivalent to 748 gallons, of wastewater treated. This is the second-lowest among other large Central- and Eastern Iowa cities, according to a chart the city provided.
Comments: (319) 339-3157; erin.jordan@thegazette.com
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