Power on at water treatment plant; residents can return to normal use
Residents can again do laundry to their hearts’ content, after power was restored at the Buffalo Pound Water Treatment Plant.
The City of Regina called on residents to conserve water at a Wednesday morning press conference. Officials reported that the treatment plant, which supplies clean water to Moose Jaw and Regina, had faced three power outages in five days.
The latest outage began Wednesday morning. Ryan Johnson, general manager of the Buffalo Pound Water Treatment Corporation, said it was fixed around supper time that day.
“At this point in time things are working well and there are no power issues,” Johnson told the Leader-post by email Thursday at 1:30 p.m. He later explained that the plant is supplying enough water to meet normal winter demand for both cities.
Staff brought in rented generators as a backup solution on Wednesday, according to Johnson. He said the units are now on site and ready to step in if another outage strikes the plant, something Johnson said remains a possibility.
“Until the rime frost is off the lines, we’re going to be assuming it will to happen again,” Johnson said. “That’s from a planning perspective.”
Regina city spokeswoman Desirae Bernreuther said residents can now return to normal water use. The City of Moose Jaw did not explicitly call on its residents to conserve water during the outage.
Wednesday’s outage followed similar issues on Tuesday, the day of a massive power outage that affected as many as 200,000 people in the province. The plant also lost power for 10 hours on Saturday. Johnson said the issues were caused by shorts triggered by frost on the single power line that runs to the plant.
That put the plant into “emergency” mode. Regina responded by dipping into its reservoirs and activating its wells.
Johnson said the plant will soon have electrical upgrades and its own generators to prevent another outage from shutting it down.
“Sometimes timing is everything,” he said. “Five months from now this will be a non-issue.”