By John Pacenti
To make an omelet, you have to break a few eggs. When it comes to Delray Beach’s $280 million water plant, that apparently meant breaking the main line that provides water to the city.
A 36-inch water main break at Delray Beach’s water treatment plant early Jan. 3 forced the city to temporarily rely on neighboring municipalities for water supply while crews worked to repair the damage.
The break occurred around 4 a.m. that Saturday during drilling operations for a deep injection well. Utilities Director Hassan Hadjimiry said the contractor hit the underground pipe while drilling the well, which is needed to dispose of undrinkable water from the new facility’s nano-filtration system.
“These are 36-inch pipes that can carry close to 20 million gallons per day,” Hadjimiry told the City Commission at its Jan. 6 meeting. “When that is impacted, millions of gallons of water can come out in a day.”
The city contained the break by 11 p.m. the same day and immediately activated interconnections with Palm Beach County, Boca Raton and Boynton Beach to maintain water service.
Residents were never without water, though the city requested they reduce unnecessary usage for irrigation, car washing and driveway cleaning during the emergency.
Hadjimiry told The Coastal Star the incident highlights the challenges of working around aging infrastructure at the 60-plus-year-old treatment plant site, where “there are a lot of treasures that are hidden underground.” Despite the city's having maps of underground utilities, the exact locations can be difficult to pinpoint due to the facility’s age, he said.
“Whenever you open a ground that hasn’t been exposed for, God knows how many decades, you find this stuff,” he said. “You plan for the worse but hope everything gets done right.”
Youngquist Brothers, the contractor handling the deep injection well project, will bear the costs for the damaged pipe and emergency repairs, Hadjimiry said. The company specializes in deep injection wells throughout Florida.
The utilities director emphasized that water quality was never compromised during the incident.
Repairs took about a week and involved the replacement of the damaged 36-inch pipe and some defective valves discovered during the incident. “It’s not something that you go to Home Depot and get the part,” Hadjimiry said.
The water treatment plant, currently producing up to 9 million gallons per day through an alternate pipeline, continues operating normally. The new facility is scheduled for completion by mid-2028 and will significantly expand the city’s water treatment capacity from 14 million to 22 million gallons per day.
City officials participated in a groundbreaking ceremony for the new water plant on Jan. 29 at the treatment plant site.
The city’s utility system operates on an enterprise fund separate from the general budget, so repair costs and temporary water purchases from neighboring municipalities will not mean higher water bills for residents, Hadjimiry said.
Comments