RC123 MarApr 2026 - Magazine - Page 20
WASTEWATER INFRASTRUCTURE
For Polkovsky, the value of a Digital Twin extends far
beyond the ribbon-cutting ceremony. She views it as a critical
training tool for the next generation of operators. “It’s the
training aspect,” she noted. “Having people play with the
system that’s not really functioning, but they can see where
things start to break... they can really start sort of playing that
‘video game’ and understanding what happens when we
over-aerate or when we under-aerate and how we save costs
versus energy.”
However, the panel cautioned that technology is only as
good as the people using it. “The digital twin’s not the answer
that saves all the dollars,” Polkovsky warned. “You still need
that really involved project team that is looking at that lens
from the value engineering side of things to look at where we
can save, where we can spend.”
Navigating regulatory and logistical hurdles
Building wastewater plants often involves working in environmentally sensitive areas or remote locations. This requires
a level of transparency and “owning” the data that many
owners are still getting used to.
“I think it’s really about owning the information you know,
and then also identifying what you don’t know,” Polkovsky
said regarding site conditions like high groundwater or contaminated soils. She also noted the di昀케culty of permitting when
using collaborative models. “They are not getting 100 per cent
drawings when we start that permitting process. There was a
big education with our regulatory bodies of them understanding why when we have this 昀椀rst conversation, we’re looking at
30 per cent drawings.”
In British Columbia, Metro Vancouver manages these
complexities through long-term planning. “We have an overall
permitting plan,” Cotter explained. “We kind of map out for
the next 20 years what our permitting requirements are and just
staying on top of changes as we go.”
McKinnon added that technology can help bridge the
communication gap with regulators. “We have various
programs... that are helpful in demonstrating our phasing
to some of the regulatory agencies,” he said. “They can see
well enough that there’s a new river out昀氀ow... but they don’t
necessarily understand exactly how it’s going to get built.
We’re able to demonstrate to them, ‘This is how long we’ll be
actively working the river’.”
Climate resilience and adaptation
Perhaps the most pressing issue for modern wastewater
infrastructure is the changing climate. For the Iona Island
WWTP project, located at the mouth of the Fraser River, the
risks are literal and immediate.
“Our site is at risk to sea level rise,” Cotter said. “All of
the critical infrastructure will be raised to above a 昀氀ood
construction level. And then for passive 昀氀ood protection,
we’re looking at nature-based shoreline protection, wetland
protection, and planting along the shorelines.”
In Alberta, ARROW Utilities is building resiliency into the
process itself. “We made an active choice... to go to a membrane treatment (MBR) as opposed to just traditional bioreactor
treatment,” Polkovsky explained. “That does provide a level
of resiliency of being able to manage in昀氀uxes or surges of peak
20—RENEW CANADA – MARCH/APRIL 2026
昀氀ows without washing out your bacteria.”
McKinnon noted that PCL is often brought in to retroactively
protect legacy facilities. “We’ve been employed on a couple projects, not just installing berms... but installing gates on things like
storm outlets and outfalls and pipes, because really we want to also
avoid in昀氀ow and 昀氀ooding through the plant.”
The circular economy
The future of wastewater is not just about treatment, but
resource recovery. The panel discussed the growing trend of
integrating biosolids and biogas into facility design.
“Metro Vancouver has multiple facilities with RNG, so
taking the biogas o昀昀 the digesters and then either using it for
heating or electricity generation on sites or upgrading it to sell
back to Fortis in BC,” Cotter said. “We’re also looking at piloting ammonia and hydrogen recovery.”
Cotter also highlighted a cutting-edge pilot project: “Metro
Vancouver are piloting hydrothermal liquefaction as a potential treatment for biosolids. That is pretty exciting in the world
of wastewater to take sludge and making a bio crude product
from that.”
Future growth
Planning for the next 50 to 100 years requires a balance
between ambition and 昀椀scal responsibility. Overbuilding is a
waste of taxpayer dollars, while underbuilding leads to expensive emergency expansions.
“We’ve also looking to implement a modular design so we
can build out in response to reality rather than overbuilding or
under-building,” Cotter said of Metro Vancouver’s strategy.
McKinnon noted that contractors play a vital role in these
lifecycle discussions. “Part of our role for sure is to help advise
the owners and the engineers, ‘What is the cost to upsize a
pump room?’” he said. “Everyone knows it’s much, much
more expensive to expand a building than just simply put the
pumps and piping in... we’re trying to forecast future costs and
look at as well lifecycle costs for those things with the owners
all the time.”
Building relationships
The panel concluded that while technology and engineering
are the tools, relationships are the foundation of a successful
project. Polkovsky used a colorful analogy to describe the evolution of a collaborative project team.
“I have described our project as it was rainbows and butter昀氀ies to a point and we were in this newlywed experience
and then we hit that crossroads that we were either going to
stay married or get divorced,” she laughed. “They had to go
through that relationship-building process... to build that comfort... and it has been generally smooth sailing since then.”
As Canada continues to modernize its wastewater systems,
the move toward early contractor involvement, digital modeling, and climate-conscious design appears not just as a trend,
but as a survival strategy for the 21st century.
To watch a replay of the entire discussion, visit:
https://www.crowdcast.io/c/wastewater-infrastructure.
RENEWCANADA.NET
