Oconee County Utility Department Director Blames Membranes For Past Sewage Plant Woes

When a video surfaced in April of 2015 showing Oconee County discharging black water from its wastewater treatment plant into nearby Calls Creek, then Board of Commissioners Chairman Melvin Davis told the public the county had become aware of “an issue” at the plant and had it under control.

Oconee County Utility Department Director Wayne Haynie presented a very different view on Wednesday at a Board of Commissioners work session as he was making the case to abandon the existing technology used at the Calls Creek plant in favor of a new design for the plant upgrade.

Haynie described the problem at the plant before he took over as persistent and said it was due to technology that failed routinely. The plant operates efficiently today, he said, but the membranes continue to be difficult to manage.

Haynie said one of the reasons he wants to move forward as early as April on construction of the 1.5 million gallons per day replacement is to get rid of the membrane filtration technology that has crippled the plant in the past.

It is essential to move quickly on the replacement, Haynie said, since the current .667 million gallons per day plant is near capacity and the expanded plant will only get the county to a little beyond 2020.

His predecessor made that same argument about shrinking capacity to the Board of Commissioners before it voted 8 years ago–on Dec. 2, 2008--to upgrade the Calls Creek plant to 1 million gallons per day

The county, without further public discussion, never followed through on that vote.

For more on this story, including a video clip from the meeting on Wednesday and one from 2008, go to Oconee County Observations.

Pictured: Wayne Haynie.