Wisconsin wastewater plants take national awards.

Byline: Jeremy Harrell

Three wastewater-treatment plants in Wisconsin recently earned national and regional awards as outstanding examples of design and operation.

"It shows we've got the community, the consulting engineer and the operators working together," said Roger Larson, assistant director of the Bureau of Watershed Management in the state Department of Natural Resources. "If you don't have them all working together, it doesn't mean anything. They're good facilities."

The village of Amherst's wastewater-treatment facility will receive a national award in the small community category from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency next month in a ceremony in Chicago at the national conference of the Water Environmental Federation. Foth & Van Dyke, Madison, designed the Amherst facility, Larson said.

The Amherst structure in Portage County serves a population of 983 people and discharges into the Tomorrow River, which is classified as a Class I trout stream, which means that it's clean enough to support a naturally reproducing trout population, he said.

Foth & Van Dyke helped build the plant in the mid-1990s to replace a series of facilities dating from the 1940s. Its water discharge effluent is well below the limits outlined in its operating permit, according to DNR officials.

Plants in Brodhead and Thorp also won honors from the EPA, these for outstanding treatment facilities in the agency's Region 5, which covers the Great Lakes area. The two plants were among 14 nationwide that won regional awards, Larson said.