Power restored to Bend’s wastewater treatment plant

(Update: Power restored)

A private contractor clipped the main power line running into the city of Bend’s sewage treatment plant off McGrath Road Tuesday morning, cutting power to the facility for several hours, officials said.

There are several construction projects happening at the plant, and the excavator was being used by one of the construction crews working on site when a Central Electric Cooperative pole was hit just before 8 a.m., officials said.

They said power was restored by about 2 p.m.

The plant has generators operating portions of the plant, which pumps 5 to 6 million gallons per day.

Crews had to manually adjust some things, and that was impacting some of the treatment process, but city Utility Director Paul Rheault said there was little or no impact on services, and residents could continue to use water like normal.

“We may have a slight violation,” Rheault said Tuesday. “We’ll see how it goes as far as meeting our DEQ permit.”

Rheault said it’s fortunate this was not a 24 hour event. Because of this his confident they’ll still meet the requirements, but he won’t know until they have tested the water.