Odor Scrubbers At Cranberry Twp. Waste Water Plant Undergoing Rebuild
CRANBERRY TOWNSHIP (KDKA) -- A neighborhood in Butler County has been catching the scent of something foul lately as a nearby waste water plant undergoes some upgrades.
Woodbine is a typical neighborhood in Cranberry Township, but it has a very unusual neighbor.
"It smells terrible," says resident Angela Troianos.
Within sight of Troianos's deck, the sanitary waste water of Cranberry, as well as parts of Pine and Marshall Townships and New Sewickley, gets processed through the Brush Creek treatment plant every day.
"About three, three and a half million gallons a day," says Jason Kratsas, the director of engineering and environmental services.
Five odor scrubbers are constantly at work.
"They basically take the odor out of the air," Kratsas says.
Most of the time, they do their job, and the neighbors don't know the plant is even there.
"I'd say in the past two to three weeks, we've noticed it," says Troianos.
"It's a stale, musty odor," said another resident.
"We have a pool in our backyard and you want to enjoy it, and you smell it, you notice it," said resident Mike Mikus.
There's good reason why the neighbors have recently been getting a whiff. The odor scrubbers are undergoing a major rebuilding.
"We're not taking the odor control off the plant; we're just taking a fifth of it down at a time," Kratsas said.
While this tedious, piece-by-piece replacement work is being done to each scrubber, the odor it would have scrubbed is being released into the air.
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With five to do, Kratsas says, "We'll be seeing that over the next several months going through that process.
"It's not great news, but again, its part of the risk of living near that necessary evil, I guess," said Greg Larkin, another Cranberry resident.