Moccasin Bend Evironmental Campus
Major Modernization of the Campus
The Moccasin Bend Environmental Campus (formerly the Wastewater Treatment Plant) officially opened in 1961. It serves a six-county region, processing approximately 65 million gallons of wastewater per day with a peak capacity of 230 million gallons. Improving treatment capacity, performance and reliability is one of the Clear Chattanooga Program top priorities. Dozens of projects have been completed to date at the Campus, and the Wastewater Department is now engaged on a path to major overhaul of its treatment process.
The Wet Weather Treatment Upgrade Project will add a new fine screen facility and enhance the Campus’s secondary treatment capacity from 140 to a potential 210 million gallons per day. With the Class A POWER Project, the Campus will receive new aeration and nitrification processes and see 100% of its solids digested (vs. 40% currently) before getting dried by a third-party.
"Waste-to-Energy" Shift: Toward a Net-Zero Energy Campus
The Moccasin Bend Environmental Campus is the largest single consumer of electricity among all City-owned and operated facilities. Thanks to efficiency retrofits (like new equalization blowers) and a 10-acre, 4-megawatt, solar farm installed in 2020, the city has already reduced the Campus’s operational costs by $1.4 million annually.
The campus is partnering with California-based Mainspring Energy to install linear generators that will burn the methane biogas produced and collected during the digestion process. Once fully operational, these generators will offset about one-third of the plant’s electric bill by converting what was previously flared or wasted gas into on-site power.
Hamm Road Equalization Station
Equalization Stations
The current phase of Clear Chattanooga’s work includes the construction of equalization stations. There’s not enough storage capacity in this area’s wastewater system to handle the high volume of wastewater and stormwater during heavy rain events. This causes Sanitary Sewer Overflows (SSOs) when the excess water flows into streets, and yards as well as other locations.
Pump Station Construction and Rehabilitation
Clear Chattanooga’s work also involves the construction of two new pump stations, and the replacement and rehabilitation of more than two dozen existing stations. Pump stations help move the wastewater from homes and businesses to the Moccasin Bend Environmental Campus. Clear Chattanooga added pump stations to our system due to the increased demand on the system. We replaced pump stations that were reaching the end of their useful life. Rehabilitating pump stations helps increase their capacity, their performance and improve their reliability.
Citico Pump Station Reliability Project
Moccasin Bend Environmental Campus
Improving performance and reliability was also among the priorities for the Clear Chattanooga’s projects at the Moccasin Bend Environmental Campus. The campus serves more than 70,000 customers in Chattanooga and surrounding counties. It processes more than 65 million gallons of wastewater each day. The projects included the replacement of items such as the thickeners that separate liquid and solid waste as well as the back-up generator and renovations and software upgrades to our control room.