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Department of Utilities
Reference: Presentation of the Proposed 10-Year Water Tank Maintenance Program
To: Mayor Richard N. McLean and Members of City Council
Through: Clint Blackhurst, Acting City Manager
Chontel Trujillo, Assistant City Manager
Prepared By: Curtis Bauers, Director of Utilities
Date Prepared: March 6, 2017
PURPOSE
To present a summary of the City's finished-water storage tank maintenance requirements, and to propose consideration of an alternative approach to meeting these requirements. Due to years of deferred maintenance, as well as increasingly stringent inspection and reporting requirements to the Colorado Department of Health and Environment (CDPHE), this is a significant task.
BACKGROUND
The city has four storage tanks within the water distribution system for the storage of treated water necessary to meet peak-hour demands of the system for high usage periods such as fire-fighting. These tanks hold a total of 17 Million gallons of treated water, and have a total estimated value in excess of $30M. Steel tanks such as these should be considered to have a life span well in excess of 50 years, when appropriately maintained. Interior and exterior coatings of the tanks are probably the most critical of these maintenance issues. If the coatings start to fail, corrosion begins almost immediately and is difficult to control.
You may recall that Utilities staff made an inspection in 2015 of the 8.3 Million Gallon ground tank and discovered significant deterioration in its roof. The CDPHE also inspected, and required repair begin immediately. They approved a temporary repair that we were able to complete under their timeframe, with the understanding and intent that this tank would be fully re-habilitated during the winter of 2017 or 2018. Budgetary cost estimates for the work wore obtained from three entities and we have budgeted $3.1M for this work to begin as early as October 2017. Additionally, it was determined that the 3...
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