Pflugerville - Hutto Edition | July 2024

Treatment alternatives take off, drive concerns in city outskirts From the cover

What is a package plant?

Two-minute impact

Package plants are small wastewater treatment facilities, often servicing housing developments built outside of a city’s wastewater Certificate of Convenience and Necessity, or CCN. A CCN identifies the organization responsible for providing and maintaining specific utility services, such as wastewater, according to city of Hutto documents. Without a CCN, no entity is responsible for providing wastewater services to a proposed development site. Property owners must obtain a permit from TCEQ to operate a package plant facility on their land. Package plants are often pre-manufactured and arrive as one complete system ready to be installed. Earp compared them to mobile homes. “They haul them in on a trailer [and] they drop them off,” he said. Operators must comply with specific discharge and effluent standards and are required to submit monthly water quality reports. Depending on the size, the treatment facility and equipment is inspected between every 2 to 5 years, according to TCEQ.

tying wastewater services into a centralized treatment facility. Consequently, Hutto City Manager James Earp said developers on the outskirts of Hutto and Round Rock have opted for package plants. The area has now seen at least eight proposed package plants. Round Rock Mayor Craig Morgan attributes the increase in package plants throughout the area to Senate Bill 2038—passed into law in October 2023—which allows landowners and developers to remove themselves from a city’s ETJ. “When they [disannex], you’re going to have developers, like this, that have no option. … the only option they’re going to have moving forward are package plants,” Morgan said. “... This isn’t just in the Hutto, Round Rock area; it’s everywhere. If there’s vacant land around you, this is going to be the wave of the future.”

Several cities in the northeastern Austin suburbs are working to address the increased demand for wastewater services, as the area has seen a growth in development in recent years as a result of large employers such as Samsung moving to the area. Combined with the demand for homes and services, recent state legislation has left many of these budding developments in complicated jurisdictions or “no man’s land,” said Amanda Brown, a consultant from HD Brown Consulting representing a proposed 20-acre aordable townhouse development on Limmer Loop. Large, densely populated municipalities can connect wastewater lines to centralized treatment facilities to support residential growth. Regulated by the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality, these type of facilities can treat millions of gallons of wastewater per day. With communities now being built farther outside the jurisdiction of municipalities, developers are either not able to or cannot aord the cost of

1 Preserve: TCEQ permit approved Aug. 2022 2 Civitas: TCEQ permit approved Sept. 2022 3 Flora: TCEQ permit approved Aug. 2022 4 705 Limmer Loop JV LLC: Application withdrawn

5 Cielo Ranch: Working through TCEQ permitting 6 Halcyon: Working through TCEQ permitting 7 Forest Creek: renewal permit approved Feb 2024 8 Pearl Estates: Working through TCEQ permitting

Round Rock ETJ

Pflugerville ETJ Hutto ETJ Taylor ETJ City limits

Wastewater treatment process

Wastewater is flushed down pipes in homes and flows to a nearby lift station.

130 TOLL

From here, the wastewater is then pumped to a wastewater treatment plant.

95 Taylor

In the plant, the waste is spun to separate the water from sludge. The sludge sinks to the bottom.

Hutto

The water is then treated with chlorine or UV light to disinfect.

Round Rock

45 TOLL

From here the treated water is discharged, depending on size, onto the surrounding ground or into local waterways, such as creeks and rivers.

Pugerville

183

MOPAC

The sludge is hauled off to be disposed of at other treatment facilities.

SOURCE: U.S. ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION AGENCY/COMMUNITY IMPACT

SOURCES: CITY OF HUTTO, TCEQ, WILLIAMSON COUNTY/COMMUNITY IMPACT

COMMUNITYIMPACT.COM