Authority halts plan to recycle waste material

Cost of testing makes project ‘no longer worth it’

The projected cost of environmental testing has spoiled an Altoona Water Authority plan to recycle waste material at the Westerly Sewer Treatment Plant.

The material has been stored over the years coming from construction projects and street and yard excavations.

Some of the money the authority planned to spend on sorting, crushing and screening to transform the material into clean fill will go instead to cover the unexpectedly high cost of recoating two water distribution tanks.

There are about 170,000 cubic yards of rock, concrete and soil at Westerly, with not much room left, according to Mike Bianconi, director of water treatment.

To reuse some of the old material, thus saving the cost of buying topsoil and fill stone for projects and to make more room, the authority proposed spending $400,000 to rent the machinery needed for the job.

But the state Department of Environmental Protection threw up a "roadblock" -- a requirement that the authority take five samples of the spoil material for every 1,000 cubic yards reused, Bianconi said.

That would mean 850 samples, costing almost $1 million, according to information provided by Bianconi.

"It's no longer worth it for us," he said. "You can buy 10 years' worth (of stone and topsoil) for that price."

The authority estimated it could have reused about 75% of the old material.

The machinery the authority was planning to rent not only could sort, crush and screen, but also remove wire and rebar from old concrete, according to General Manager Mark Perry.

Because the authority won't be renting that equipment, it reallocated $111,000 Thursday to cover a budget shortfall for the recoating of Super High Water Storage Tank No. 2, uphill from the former Keith Athletic Field, and the Duncansville Water Storage Tank in Cedar Heights.

The low bids from Worldwide Industries for the tank recoatings totaled $950,000.

It probably wouldn't be wise to rebid the recoating in hopes of a better price because there's no guarantee the price would be better and because doing so would create a hiatus in the recoating schedule the authority has worked out for the 16 tanks in its system, Perry said.

The recoating work includes "blasting" to remove the old coating and application of primer, Perry said.

Mirror Staff Writer William Kibler is at 814-949-7038.