NewsLocal NewsIn Your Parish

Actions

Multi-million dollar sewage facility to be built in Carencro

Posted at 4:59 PM, Apr 29, 2019
and last updated 2019-04-29 18:11:56-04

A new $25 million sewage facility is set to be built in the City of Carencro.

The city secured a $2 million grant from the USDA for the construction and maintenance of the facility, and the rest is being financed through a one-cent sales tax that voters approved in 2016.

“We could see that our existing sewer plant, which is really an oxidation pond, had been around for over 50 years…and we knew we needed to do something to prepare for the future,” said city manager Don Chauvin.

The city’s main sewage plant, sitting on roughly 70 acres of land, is off of Post Rd. and will be the site of the new facility.

Residents who live nearby say they’re excited for the new sewage plant to be built because the current pond sometimes gives off a terrible smell.

Chauvin says the new facility won’t have that issue.

“The sewage comes in, it will go to this sludge thickening tank and then the sludge is brought into the processing part of it and then it’s eventually dried,” explained Chauvin.

Plans for new Carencro sewage plant

The state of the art facility will take the waste and turn it into fertilizer, which the city intends to sell or use to grow hay.

“So gone are the days of us simply just filling the pond slowly with sludge. And it’s so much more environmentally friendly because we’re taking the sludge and putting it back to use,” said Chauvin.

The city currently has two out-dated facilities. This new one will replace both and also meet their future needs, without raising the customer’s rates.

“This plant will be able to meet our needs today and it can be increased in size up to four times so we have the capabilities of handling everything the city needs for at least the next 50 years,” said Chauvin.

Bids for the work will go out in the fall and construction is expected to start in the beginning of 2020.

Chauvin says it should take about 3 years to complete.