Case Study
Columbine Water Treatment Plant
Application: Plant retrofit into existing granular fil-
ter media
Capacity: 50 MGD (187,500 m3/d)
Location: Thornton, Colorado, United States
Commissioned: March 2005
Given the high degree of wastewater effluent in our
source water, we knew that we needed an advanced
treatment process such as ultrafiltration membranes
to ensure that we could provide the best quality wa-
ter for the city, Frank Watt, Water Treatment Plant
Supervisor for the City of Thornton.
Introduction
Water quality was a major concern for the Colum-
bine Water Treatment Plant (WTP), a large 30-
million gallon per day (MGD) (113,562 m3/d) dual-
media gravity filtration facility in the City of
Thornton, Colorado. The WTP draws its water from
both the South Platte River and Clear Creek. With 10
to 15 wastewater treatment plants upriver, nitrates,
total dissolved solids (TDS), and hardness are quite
high by the time the water reaches the intake pipes
of the Columbine WTP. In fact, at various times
throughout the year, treated wastewater effluent
can comprise up to 70 percent of the water flowing
past Thornton.
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The high degree of wastewater effluent in the
source water needed an advanced treatment pro-
cess to ensure that the City of Thornton receives the
highest quality drinking water. Water managers
decided that a retrofit strategy was the best way to
meet the fiscal, technical, and performance re-
quirements for the 30-year old facility.
For many conventional treatment plants, immersed
hollow-fiber membrane cassettes can simply re-
place granular filter media in the existing basins.
During the retrofit process, granular filter media are
removed, piping is modified to accommodate the
membrane system and increased flow parameters,
and pumps and blowers are installed for permeate
production, backpulse cleaning, and aeration.
A retrofit would enable the plant to quickly and
cost-effectively increase both treatment capacity
and water quality without building new structures
for the process equipment. Municipalities benefit by
avoiding large capital costs resulting from site ac-
quisition and building construction, while dramati-
cally improving water quality and increasing plant
capacity.
GE ZeeWeed* immersed ultrafiltration membranes
were selected to be retrofitted into existing filter
basins based on the present worth cost evaluation
on, high value, and outstanding performance that
the system demonstrated.
Process Overview
Raw water is pumped from the lakes and is pre-
treated by coagulation, flocculation, and sedimen-
tation through four upflow solids clarifiers. From the
clarifiers, the water flows to the ZeeWeed process
tanks. Seven trains of ZeeWeed membranes, each
with ten cassettes, provide treatment for up to 50
MGD (187,500 m3/d) of water.
Thousands of membrane fibers hang loosely in
each membrane cassette and a slight vacuum is
applied to the end of each membrane fiber to draw
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water through microscopic pores and into the hol-
low fibers. With a nominal pore size of 0.04m, the
membranes form a physical barrier to suspended
solids and provide greater than 4-log removal of
pathogens such as Giardia and Cryptosporidium,
and turbidity of less than 0.1 NTU. Rejected particles
remain in the process tank and are discharged to
reject equalization tanks. From these tanks, reject
transfer pumps feed the water to the second stage
filtration train.
The second stage, 2.1 MGD (7,570 m3/d) train en-
hances the recovery of potable water from the river
and is made up of five ZeeWeed cassettes. The con-
figuration enables the plant to recover more than
ZeeWeed retrofit into granular filter basin Capacity: 50 MGD
99 percent of potable water from the river and also
(187,500 m3/d)
substantially reduces the cost of raw water pump-
ing. UV disinfection and chlorination will be the final
step of the treatment process before the water is
released to the distribution system. Reject water
from the second stage flows by gravity to settling
ponds where it is held for a short time prior to flow-
ing back to the first lake in the reservoir system.

Typical Treated Water Results

Raw Water Filtered Water

Turbidity (NTU) 1.5 - 40 < 0.1

Cryptosporidium N/A > 4 log removal

Giardia N/A > 4 log removal

Pre-retrofit granular filter basins Capacity: 30 MGD (113,600
m3/d)

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