Providing clean, fresh water for Rochelle

By: Lori Hammelman
Posted 5/4/17

Most people don’t give much thought when turning on the faucet, but many individuals are involved in providing fresh, clean drinking water to the Rochelle community.

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Providing clean, fresh water for Rochelle

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ROCHELLE — Most people don’t give much thought when turning on the faucet, but many individuals are involved in providing fresh, clean drinking water to the Rochelle community.
Between three and five million gallons of water are pumped each day from five deep wells located between 800 and 1,500 feet below the surface. The water is stored in the four water towers and pumped through 105 miles of water mains within the city.
Employees work behind the scenes to ensure the water delivered to consumers meets all federal and state standards, tested every day by four water operators at 30 different sampling sites throughout the city.
Water/Water Reclamation Superintendent Adam Lanning explained as the water is pumped, fluoride is added along with chlorine to kill any disease-causing pathogens that could be in the water.
“Recently we have reevaluated our sampling plan to maintain minimum chlorine levels throughout the city,” Lanning said. “We have to maintain chlorine levels at the farthest points of the city and had to adjust the dosages to maintain those minimum levels.”
Lanning explained the water department maintains levels that fall under the maximum allowable amount in a public water supply.
Aside from the water operators testing in the field, lab employees also conduct tests. The Environmental Protection Agency also determines how often these tests are to be conducted, mostly quarterly and yearly.

Learn about your water
Lab technician Sharon Hawkins explained Rochelle Municipal Utilities publishes the tests results on their website as required by law. The department has until July 1 to post last year’s results.

“If anyone would like to know current results from this year, they are more than welcome to contact us,” Hawkins said.
Along with water testing, there are many other duties involved in making sure the community has fresh, clean water available at a moment’s notice. Around 1,400 water distribution valves need to be exercised along with 800 fire hydrants that need to be flushed every year. Certain hydrants, due to their locations, need to be flushed on a monthly basis.
“In addition to testing and sample collection and flushing hydrants, the crews repair any main breaks that occur, replace valves as needed, change water meters, replace fire hydrants and locate underground utilities,” Lanning explained. “We conduct most repairs on the entire system ourselves, we try not to contract work out.”
Everyone contributes to drinking water quality, from water conservation to ensuring certain things do not go down the drain.
Just recently RMU completed its newest well and tower, Well 12 located at Hayes Road after 12 months of construction at a project cost of $4.9 million.
Future plans include constructing a radium removal plant at Well 11 on Flagg road by Rochelle Township High School and expect the plant to be operational February 2018.