Challenge

The Homestead, America’s oldest destination resort, is located approximately 170 miles west of Richmond, Va. The resort began providing guest accommodations in 1766, and today features 486 guestrooms, 88 suites, skiing, golfing, skating, a beautiful spa and many other amenities. Homestead Water Company, the private company established to serve the resort, also supplies water to about 420 additional area customers.

The private water system is fed from springs located on nearby Warm Springs Mountain. The water has a relatively consistent temperature of 55ºF, and low turbidity ranging from less than 1.0 NTU to 2.0 NTU. However, to meet the requirements of the Surface Water Treatment Rule (SWTR), the water company needed a filtration technology that would provide an absolute barrier against pathogens such as Cryptosporidium, Giardia, and bacteria.

Solution

Following a comprehensive evaluation, the water company’s consulting engineer recommended the Memcor® XS submerged packaged membrane filtration system.  This pre-engineered, skidded membrane system from Siemens Water Technologies is pre-wired, pre-piped and factory tested before shipment.  The system installed at The Homestead consists of three Memcor XS submerged packaged membrane units, each containing 48 oxidant-tolerant membrane modules. Each unit is designed to produce 200-400 gallons per minute (gpm), for a total capacity of 1.3 million gallons per day (MGD).  Since its start-up in May 2006, the system has maintained turbidity levels of less than 0.025 NTU, well below the plant’s permitted upper limit.

The Memcor XS system is fully automated and self-cleaning.  backwash removes the solids build-up on the membrane surface at regular, operator-adjustable intervals. An especially beneficial feature for the water company has been the new plant’s SCADA system, which allows the automatically controlled plant to be monitored from remote locations.

Results

Operating costs for the new membrane filtration system are low because it treats the resort’s water without the need for chemical or mechanical pretreatment, and manpower requirements are relatively small.
 
By implementing the Memcor XS submerged packaged membrane filtration system, Homestead Water Company now has a cost effective, reliable filtration system to protect public health and meet SWTR requirements.  The water company is also benefiting from the plant’s local control system, ensuring that operating procedures for filtration, backwash, clean-in-place (CIP) and integrity testing are correctly carried out.