February -- Purification Plant

Between 1892 and 1900, however, much valuable knowledge had been gained as to the proper methods to be applied for the purification of Mississippi River water. With this end in view four small plants, designed to handle, in different ways, an aggregate of one hundred thousand (100,000) gallons of water per day, were constructed in 1900, with the view of determining the most economical and satisfactory method of treatment, as well as to demonstrate to the people of New Orleans that the Mississippi River water could be economically and successfully purified. The first question to be decided in designing a water works system was the capacity of the plant to be constructed. In his investigations Mr. Earl learned that European cities found thirty (30) to forty (40) gallons per capita per day an adequate capacity for their water plants, while American cities varied from sixty (60) to nearly three hundred (300) gallons per capita a day. The old Water Works Company, with only seven thousand (7,000) connections, indicating less than twenty-five thousand (25,000) consumers, was pumping as much as twenty million (20,000,000), or eight hundred (800) gallons per capita of consumption. The importance of reaching an adequate conclusion in this matter was obvious, for if the capacity of the proposed plant was placed too high, the water and sewerage systems would have been so costly in construction, operation and maintenance as to render them impracticable. The high consumption of water in this country is due to the flat rate system which is in vogue in many of our larger cities. In recommending the assumption of an average per capita per day consumption of eighty gallons for New Orleans, the object was to hold the total output within this limit, to meter all water consumers, requiring them to p9pay for the actual amount of water used, thereby giving them opportunity to save cost in proportion as they avoided useless waste of water. Of course, it is not presumed that the individual will use any such amount as eighty (80) gallons of water a day, but that the total population served multiplied by that number of gallons will approximate the average amount of water required for the community as a whole. The governing factors in determining the system of water purification for New Orleans was, first, to remove the suspended matter from the river water, ranging from two hundred (200) to fifteen hundred (1,500) parts per million (1,000,000) and averaging over six hundred (600) parts; and, second, to reduce its hardness and to provide for the elimination of all harmful bacteria. The bacteria existing in the Mississippi River water show vastly less signs of the effect of sewerage discharge from the cities above New Orleans than are found in the river water reaching any of the higher cities, due to the great distance traveled, as well as to the effective conditions present in the river water for the eradication of objectionable bacteria. The water is taken from the Mississippi River at the upper end of the city, ten miles above the nearest sewer outlet. The New Orleans plant can turn out an effluent without filtration, which, Mr. Earl says, would have been considered entirely satisfactory before the people became educated to the perfect output from the complete plant. The effluent from the filters has always been entirely free from suspended matter, bright, sparkling and a perfectly safe and satisfactory water for all purposes. It possesses every desirable characteristic that could be found in the best natural water supply. All the processes to which it is subjected are nature's processes, and absolutely under the control of human intelligence for the production of perfect results. The Crescent City being almost perfectly flat, there is no possibility of having a reservoir at a high elevation into which water can be pumped and from which the supply can be drawn, and the construction of a stand pipe large enough to be of any effect in equalizing the pump load in a large capacity water works system being impracticable, it is necessary, by pump regulation, to maintain whatever pressure is required in the distribution system. The New Orleans pumps can be adjusted to maintain whatever pressure is desired, and will automatically increase p10or decrease their speed as is necessary to deliver the quantity of water which is being drawn from the mains. The pressure thus maintained constantly is just as effective and as satisfactory for all purposes as though it were supplied from a high-level reservoir. The construction of the new system was commenced in 1905 and the completed system went into operation in February, 1909. Only three and a half years were consumed in the construction of a plant covering over five hundred (500) miles of streets with water mains and supplying five thousand (5,000) fire hydrants, located at all street intersections with a pressure from sixty (60) to ninety-five (95) pounds per square inch, which is found fully adequate for fire protection, including two pumping and purification plants, one on each side of the Mississippi River, having a capacity to purify and deliver, under full pressure, sixty-six million (66,000,000) gallons of water per day. The cost of the plant to date, including about forty-six thousand (46,000) connections and meters to the property line, and supplying over sixty-one thousand (61,000) premises, with now 566 miles of mains, has been about nine million two hundred thousand ($9,200,000) dollars. By 1917 it is expected that all of the premises of the city will have been connected both with the water works and with the sewers, and vaultsº and cesspools will have been eliminated from the entire well built-up area of the city. The Sewerage and Water Board charges for two different items of service — the one is the cost of doing business with the consumer; the other the cost of supplying water to his connection at the main. The Board makes the connection from the water main to the property line and places the meter as part of the cost of construction. Then it maintains the meter and connections in service and eventually renews them. It also reads the meter, keeps the account and makes the collection. The cost varies with the size of the meter and connection. For instance, for a five‑eighth-inch meter the charge is three ($3.00) dollars per annum, and this has nothing to do with the charge for water furnished through the meter, the charge for which, much or little, amounts practically to seven (7) cents per one thousand (1,000) gallons. Under this arrangement anybody gets exactly what he wants, and everybody pays the same price that anyone else pays for everything he gets. If a person wants a very large supply available p11for use, but only uses it for a few moments a year, having practically no consumption, and another person desires the use of a very small quantity of water constantly, thus making a very large consumption through a small connection, and still another wants the convenience of water available through a small connection, but has occasion to use almost none at all, each can get exactly what he wants on a basis which is fair to each, as also to the city itself. No other water rate system ever devised can meet these tests.