Utility seeks renewal of permit that could allow it to operate two wastewater plants along Rt. 161 near Alexandria

The Licking Regional Water District is seeking renewal of a permit to operate a second wastewater treatment facility in the Rt. 161 corridor near Alexandria between New Albany and Granville.

The Ohio Environmental Protection Agency has set a hearing for 6 p.m. on Thursday, Jan. 23, 2025, at the Church of Christ at Alexandria to take public comment on renewal of a permit that was previously issued for the plant that was never built.

The utility formerly known as Southwest Licking Community Water and Sewer District first applied for a permit in 2018, and it was approved for eight acres the utility owns on Jersey Mill Road NW, just east of Rt. 310.

Jim Roberts, executive director of Licking Regional Water, said this week that the utility planned the wastewater treatment plant for that site prior to Intel’s January 2022 announcement to build a $28 billion computer-chip manufacturing campus in western Licking County.

“When the Intel announcement came, and growth was expected to be much bigger than what a plant that size could handle, the district did a reboot and that’s when we essentially put that on hold,” Roberts said.

Because the plant proposed for Jersey Mill Road would not be large enough to handle all of the sewage treatment needs for the commercial and residential growth in the corridor, he said, the utility bought a larger tract of land. Those 92 acres are bordered by Outville Road on the west, Morse Road on the south and Rt. 161 on the north, and they are about 6 miles east of the Jersey Mill site.

Licking Regional Water is currently waiting to hear from the Ohio EPA about whether it will issue permits that will allow the utility to operate the larger plant, which could treat up to 3 million gallons of wastewater a day and discharge treated water into Moots Run, a small tributary of Raccoon Creek. As it waits for permits, the utility is also designing the proposed Raccoon facility and would like to start construction in 2025.

Cost is estimated at up to $90 million, and it’s possible the plant could be expanded in the future – and that a plant to treat and supply drinking water to the Rt. 161 corridor also could be built on what the utility calls the “Raccoon” site.

The smaller, previously approved plant, if built, could treat 250,000 to 1 million gallons of wastewater a day, and discharge the treated water into Pet Run, another small tributary of Raccoon Creek.

Roberts said the utility currently has no immediate plans to build what it calls the Pet Run plant in permit documents – if the larger Raccoon plant is approved. But permits such as those previously approved for the Pet Run project must be renewed periodically, and Licking Regional Water does not want to lose the option to build the plant if needed.

“There’s already a permit there, so it’s been through that process once already,” Roberts said. “It’s a smaller discharge. We think it should be pretty straight forward, and we hope it goes smoothly.”

Many residents and some officials in Alexandria, Granville, Granville Township and St. Albans Township have been vocal about their concerns that a discharge of 1 million gallons or more a day would overload small streams that typically have low flows during normal weather conditions. And during dry months, small creeks such as Moots Run slow to a trickle. More than 200 people showed up for a July hearing on the proposed Raccoon project, many of them voicing objections.

Read more: A packed house tells the Ohio EPA: Don’t approve a permit for a sewage-treatment plant near Alexandria and Granville

The official address for the Pet Run project is 2202 State Route 310, Alexandria, according to EPA documents, but access to the property is on Jersey Mill Road.

Comments about the permit renewal should be submitted in person, by email or by mail by Jan. 30, 2025. Comments should be emailed to epa.dswcomments@epa.ohio.gov or delivered or mailed to both of the following locations: 1) Ohio Environmental Protection Agency, Lazarus Government Center, Division of Surface Water, Permits Processing Unit, 50 W. Town St., Suite 700, P.O. Box 1049, Columbus, OH 43216-1049 and 2) Ohio Environmental Protection Agency, Central District Office, PO Box 1049, Columbus, OH 43216-1049.

Written comments to the Ohio EPA should include the following numbers next to the address on an envelope, within the body of an email or a letter attached to an email, and on each page of any submitted comments. The numbers for the Pet Run permit renewal request are Ohio EPA Permit number 4PQ00005*CD, application number OH0149764, and public notice number 207978.

Alan Miller writes for TheReportingProject.org, the nonprofit news organization of Denison University’s Journalism program, which is supported by generous donations from readers. Sign up for The Reporting Project newsletter here.