Nearly 115 years ago, on New Year’s Day 1897, the Twin Village Water Company began providing water service to private residences in Damariscotta and Newcastle.
Today, the quasi-municipal Great Salt Bay Sanitary District (GSBSD) serves the same function. The original, 1896 pumping station still stands, and the pristine waters of Little Pond still supply the tens of millions of gallons of water the area consumes each year.
Little else about the operation remains the same, however.
“We have really improved this system in the past few years,” Great Salt Bay Sanitary District Trustee Kit Hayden said.
Two years ago, a $1 million loan and a $500,000 rural development grant from the U.S. Dept. of Agriculture paid for a series of capital projects, including the addition of ultraviolet water treatment units, the construction of two buildings and a 170,000-gallon standpipe and the painting of another standpipe.
The improvements will help the district avoid building a filtration plant, a proposition that could cost “millions of dollars” and require 24/7 staffing, Water Division Manager Scott Abbotoni said.
The district plans to use remaining funds for repairs to Pumping Station Road, the long, gravel drive that leads to the pumping station.
If not for the district’s presence, the shady clearing on Little Pond might make a perfect vacation spot. The district’s ownership of the pond’s borders helps ensure a safe, clean water supply.
“We own almost 99 percent of the watershed” with the exception of a small, private camp, Abbotoni said.
Everything starts at the pumping station, which pumps water from a point about 120 feet offshore in roughly 20 feet of water. The water enters the building, where ultraviolet light from two small, energy efficient (yet expensive – approximately $120,000 each) units inactivates any pathogens in the water.
Following the ultraviolet light treatment, the system automatically adds chlorine, a disinfectant, to the water. The pumps move the water uphill at a rate of 300-320 gallons per minute into the chemical feed building.
Here, in a small, garage-like structure, ammonium sulfate, soda ash (pH and corrosion control), sodium fluoride (cavity prevention), sodium hypochlorite (a viricide) and sodium silicate (corrosion control) are all added to the water.
Ammonium sulfate reacts with chlorine to create chloramines, which stop the formation of harmful disinfection byproducts like trihalomethanes (THM) and haloacetic acids (HAA5).
Sodium fluoride is the source of some controversy, locally as well as internationally, regarding its health benefits and potential side effects. A group of concerned citizens have gathered signatures to place the issue before Damariscotta and Newcastle voters in 2012.
District staff, with the help of a sophisticated electronic security system, carefully monitors the level of fluoride and other chemicals in the water supply. If the concentration of chlorine, fluoride or the pH level rises or sinks to a level outside the norm, computers sound the alarm and a private security firm notifies district personnel.
GSBSD employs five people – the office manager, the water division (Abbotoni and plant operator Sal Bartolotta) and two people in the wastewater division.
The four operators cross-train in water and wastewater and are certified to work in either division.
For the most part, however, it’s Abbotoni and Bartolotta who constantly monitor the waterworks.
A district operator is on call 24/7. Abbotoni, as manager, can monitor goings-on at the facilities from home with a laptop linked to district computers.
District employees don’t just wait for an alarm on weekends, they also make mandatory visits to the facilities and conduct tests “to make sure everything is okay,” Abbotoni said.
The district’s hard work and success is receiving recognition, and not just in the community. The Center for Disease Control and Prevention awarded the district a “certificate of excellence” for “community water fluoridation” on April 8. The certificate recognizes the district for maintaining consistent fluoride levels per state recommendations.
The New England Interstate Water Pollution Control Commission has also seen fit to applaud the district’s performance, running a photograph of district employees in a commission periodical with a caption recognizing GSBSD as “highly regarded for its work in quality control, including fluoridation.”
The chemicals amount to a tiny fraction of the water people use. Chloramines account for about 0.12 parts per million, sodium silicate for eight and fluoride for 0.6-0.8.
In just the last year, GSBSD, after struggling to eradicate the presence of copper, lead and other potentially harmful materials from the water supply, has “made great strides” and is now fully in compliance with all federal guidelines, Abbotoni said.
From the chemical feed building, the water, now ready for consumption by the public, is pumped into the Welton Standpipe, the 500,000-gallon Academy Hill standpipe, and local homes and businesses.
The locations of the storage tanks, at areas above most of the towns they serve, allow gravity to handle the bulk of labor. If disaster strikes, knocking out electricity and generators, there will still be three days’ supply in the tanks, Abbotoni said.
The Great Salt Bay Sanitary District Board of Trustees invites the public to attend its meetings, the second Wednesday of every month at 5 p.m. at the district office at 121 Piper Mill Rd. in Damariscotta.