10-25-2010 Council Minutes - Laserfiche WebLink

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MINUTES OF THE ORONO CITY "COUNCIL MEETING Monday, October 25, 2010 • 7:00 o'clock p.m. (9. LONG LAKE - ORONO WATER SYSTEM, Continued) Murphy stated the fact of the matter is that there is sharing of water. Kellogg stated the interconnects were installed in 2003 or 2004 and were basically left wide open. There was a significant amount of unaccounted water at that time and there were no meters on the interconnects. The Orono tower is 6.5 feet taller than the Long Lake tower so no water can go from Long Lake to Orono until the water elevation in the Orono tower falls below the water elevation in the Long Lake tower. After the discrepancy in 2005 -2007, the decision was made to completely shut those automatic valves. Following further discussion, it was decided not to completely shut them off any longer and that the water would only be needed for firefighting purposes. Murphy stated another issue is those interconnects were installed at a time to help bolster the relationship between the two cities. Murphy asked what impact this has on Orono's long -term need for additional water in this area of town once the buildings in the industrial park become occupied. Murphy stated they also need to know where the water is going. Kellogg stated there are some likely explanations but they need to be investigated. Murphy asked what those explanations generally are. • Kellogg indicated they are in the process of replacing meters at the school. Unless the schools were running a fixture that was drawing more than seven gallons a minute, the meters were not registering the water. The Public Works Department is in the process of helping the school district replace their meters. Kellogg stated in reviewing well pumping records for the 10 -year period from 1998 to 2007, it appears there are some peculiarities that need further investigation. For planning purposes, it is generally accepted practice to assume a water use of 100 gallons per capita per day. Based on the pumping records over the 10 -year period, the north Orono water system averages nearly 200 gcd. It is also generally accepted practice to assume the ratio of the maximum day demand to the average day demand to be 3.0. This average ratio over the 10 -year period noted above is 5.94 or nearly twice the industry accepted number. Following a review of the system, Kellogg indicated that the results using these conservative practices somewhat overstate the needed storage for the Orono and Long Lake water systems. This is especially true in the Minnesota climate where the negative affects of freezing water in storage tanks and ice damage need to be weighed against the benefits of having a conservatively large volume of water storage. At the present time there are two automatic interconnect valve locations along Old Highway 12, one at Brimhall Avenue and one at Shaughnessy Avenue. These valves are currently set at a pressure such that the two systems do not normally share water and are only active in the event of a low pressure in either Long Lake or Orono. The interconnect valves could be set up in a manner that all of the water between the two communities could be shared except for the top 6.5 feet of the Orono elevated tank. This would be advantageous to both communities from a firm capacity supply standpoint. • The installation of Well #4 is dependent on variables such as performance of the existing well, future development and associated demand, and the ability to share water with Long Lake. The capacity of the existing well serving the north Orono water system has been declining over time. Originally the capacity Page 11 of 17