$230M overhaul starts on Arkansas’ biggest water plant

Arkansas’ largest water treatment plant is undergoing its first overhaul at the cost of $230 million. Early construction work started about a month ago on the Little Rock facility, according to Douglas Shackelford, spokesperson for Central Arkansas Water.

The renovation of the nearly 70-year-old Jack H. Wilson Water Treatment Plant is Central Arkansas Water’s biggest-ever, Shackelford told Construction Dive. The project aims to bolster the region’s drinking water supply for the coming decades by improving the plant’s efficiency, addressing deferred maintenance and equipping it with modern water treatment techniques.

Mandeville, Louisiana-headquartered Max Foote Construction is the construction manager at risk, according to Shackelford. New York City-based Hazen and Sawyer and Fort Smith, Arkansas-headquartered Hawkins-Weir Engineers were hired to work collaboratively on design phase services, he said.

Central Arkansas Water’s board of commissioners approved a bond issue of up to $230 million to overhaul the plant, June 12 board documents show. The board approved a $219.2 million guaranteed maximum price contract for construction in March, and officials hope to close the bond transaction in July, the Northwest Arkansas Democrat-Gazette reported. 

Construction will be conducted in phases while the Wilson facility continues to operate, and work is expected to take about five years to complete, Shackelford said.

“This plant is vital to our system, and so we can’t shut it down. It’s got to be operational while construction is going on,” Shackelford said. “There are four large water basins in the facility, and we will essentially shut down one and renovate that basin and then keep the other three open and working while one is under construction.”

The Wilson plant currently has a treatment capability of 133 million gallons per day, and the updates will increase its capacity up to 150 million, according to Shackelford. It receives water from the Lake Maumelle reservoir, which the utility also owns.

“[New technology is] going to allow us to move the water through it at a faster pace that would allow for the capacity increase,” Shackelford said. That will “help us out in the long run, because obviously, as cities grow and demand goes higher for water, we need to be able to produce it.”