BY DAN HILDEBRAN
A director for the St. Johns River Water Management District told the organization’s governing board that the Black Creek Water Resource Development Project could be activated sometime in November.
Dale Jenkins, the director of the district’s Division of Infrastructure and Land Resources, told the board during its October meeting that the project’s treatment plant within Camp Blanding had reached its 95% completion milestone.
The Black Creek Water Resource Development Project consists of a 17-mile pipeline, pumps, and a treatment facility within the National Guard training facility. It could divert up to 10 million gallons of water a day from Black Creek to Keystone Heights area lakes. It is designed to replenish the Floridan Aquifer and is part of the district’s recovery plan for minimum flows and levels of Lake Brooklyn and Lake Geneva.
The Florida Legislature appropriated $43.4 million for the project, and North Florida utilities kicked in an additional $19.2 million. The district is paying the balance. The last cost estimate for the project was $118.7 million.
The treatment facility consists of six cells of media and plants designed to filter tannins and other impurities from the creek’s brown water before it is discharged into Alligator Creek, upstream from Lake Brooklyn.
Jenkins stated that over the last 30 days, contractors had installed computer-based monitoring and control systems in Cells 1 through 3, and Cell 4 was filled with filtering media.
“I’m happy to report that preliminary water quality results indicated that the water coming out of Cell 4 met water quality standards,” Jenkins told the board. “Piping installation was completed in cells number five and six. We began bringing media into cell five just yesterday, and we should be done placing stone in cell six by the end of this month.”
The director stated that the district has added an additional step in the treatment facility construction. He said contractors will enhance the outfall area in Alligator Creek by adding erosion control measures.
“So, once we get that all constructed,” he said, “probably sometime in the next two to four weeks, then we should be ready, as long as enough water is available in Black Creek to start pumping water.”
