Tampa Bay Water to decide on reservoir's future

On Monday, the board running Tampa Bay Water will decide whether to embark on a costly, lengthy process of repairing the utility's flawed reservoir in southern Hillsborough County.

If the regional utility board follows the suggestion of its general manager, it could be five years before the C.W. "Bill" Young Regional Reservoir is repaired.

The reservoir will be out of service for two dry seasons while the repairs are under way.
A rough estimate of the cost is $125 million but the true price won't be known until bids are opened in three years.

The reservoir cost $147 million to build.

Repairs are needed to prevent further cracking of the soil cement that covers the reservoir sides and bottom. The cracks were first noticed in 2006 and utility officials said then they were normal, expected and only cosmetic.

The reservoir is sound and is not in danger of leaking, Gerald Seeber, Tampa Bay Water's general manager says. The soil cement is intended to prevent erosion of a layer of soil covering a membrane that holds water inside the reservoir.

After at least two years of investigation, engineers determined that layer of soil is saturated. As water in the reservoir is raised and lowered, changes in pressure cause cracking of the soil cement covering.

During last summer, the utility couldn't fill the reservoir to its capacity of 15 billion gallons and it went dry at the end of March, leaving the Tampa Bay area without its main source of water during the dry spring months.

Last month, workers finished temporary repairs of the cracks and Tampa Bay Water officials say the reservoir can be filled this summer if there is enough rainfall.

Though the reservoir is serviceable, the root cause of the cracks needs to be fixed, Seeber says.
Repairs will take so long because Seeber proposes a lengthy process to select a company to design a fix, along with an independent review of the proposed solution.

Picking someone to fix the reservoir could take up to three years.

Once a company is selected, the work will take two years, Seeber says. The utility that provides water for Hillsborough, Pinellas, Pasco, Tampa, St. Petersburg and New Port Richey will not be able to use the reservoir while repairs are made.

During the season, Tampa Bay Water leans heavily on the reservoir for drinking water. With the reservoir shut down for two dry seasons, the utility will have to rely on wellfields and its desalination plant. That is the same combination of sources Tampa Bay Water used since March when the reservoir went dry.

For budgeting purposes, Seeber estimated the project's cost at $125 million but that number could easily change, he says.

The utility has sued the designer, builder and construction supervisor of the reservoir to recover repair costs. The federal court trial is scheduled to start July 11.

Seeber envisions three possible solutions.

One is to add a drainage system to the layer of dirt between the soil cement and membrane.

Another is to remove the dirt and place a new soil cement layer atop the membrane.

The last is to add more soil cement to weigh down the existing soil cement covering.

Tampa Bay Water's meeting starts at 9 a.m. at its headquarters building, 2575 Enterprise Road, Clearwater.