It’s one of the luxuries of living in a developed nation in the 21st century, that we needn’t spare a thought when flushing the toilet, taking a shower, or doing a load of laundry.
Had we any reason to think about it at all—as Chicagoans did in the 19th century, thousands of whom died of waterborne illnesses after drinking filth from Lake Michigan—we’d seriously be searching for a more salubrious and wholesome community to call home.
But no. Our waste is simply carried away and dealt with, where and how most of us probably don’t know or care. Which is a luxury.
Every day, the Chesterton Utility treats some 2 to 4 million gallons of wastewater, not quite—not yet—a billion gallons every year, by removing the pollutants and then disinfecting it before discharging the reclaimed water into the Little Calumet River.
The infrastructure required to do this represents the Town of Chesterton’s single greatest capital investment: Clarifiers to separate and remove the solids; digesters to decompose the organic waste; chemical and UV applications to disinfect the effluent; a 1.2-million gallon storage basin just to hold the influent during heavy rain events to keep the plant from swamping.
A schematic of the whole plant would resemble some vast Rube Goldberg device—or multiple Rube Goldberg devices bolted together—whose workings are as arcane as alchemy and as vital as dialysis.
For years, Bill Williams—the Town of Chesterton’s longest serving municipal employee, who earned his first paycheck in 1976—has been keeping his hand on the dials and his eyes on the meters, certified by the Indiana Department of Environmental Management as a Class IV Wastewater Operator.
Class IV Wastewater Operator is a position of significant accountability, all the more so because the Town of Chesterton’s treatment plant—otherwise known as the Fritz Dietrich Environmental Control Facility—outfalls into a tributary of Lake Michigan, one of the world’s largest bodies of freshwater. All the more so too because the Class IV operator is qualified to run a plant with a design population equivalent greater than 40,000.
Enter now Leah Leimbacher, for seven years the Chesterton Utility’s Lab Chief, under whose watch the Utility has been presented in all seven of those years with the Indiana Water Environment Association’s Laboratory Excellence Award. On Aug. 30, Leimbacher earned her own Class IV Wastewater Operator’s certification, after passing what she called a “beast” of an exam with flying colors.
In fact Leimbacher beasted the beast: On an exam whose lowest passing grade is 70 percent, she scored a 94.
is quite clear on how challenging the Class IV Wastewater Operator’s job is—and what exactly’s at stake in doing it well—in discussing Chief Operator Williams’ duties. “All wastewater plants have a National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System (NPDES) permit,” she says. “The permit stipulates our effluent limitations. In other words, it sets our discharge limits of pollutants. Bill has a huge responsibility to make sure we stay in compliance with our permit, with daily operational adjustments, routine maintenance of all the equipment, and troubleshooting when things go wrong.”
Under Leimbacher—ably assisted by technicians Joyce Kaleta and Christine Akemon—the Lab is Williams’ early warning system and the three water samples taken daily something like canaries in a coal mine. As Leimbacher notes, the NPDES permit obligates the Utility to test both influent and effluent as well as water in the process of being treated.
“As Laboratory Chief, it’s my first responsibility to ensure that the lab produces defensible data, as these are what we cite on the monthly discharge reports which we send to the EPA,” Leimbacher says. “We have to make sure that the Lab is following the correct, current, and approved EPA methods and making sure our numbers are validated by strict quality control criteria.”
In all of its operations, the Lab aligns its protocols to EPA’s own rigorous standards or even higher. “Everything from the way we collect, track, store, and preserve the samples to how soon the samples have be analyzed after they’re collected is regulated,” Leimbacher says. “The glassware and pipets have to be a certain calibration. The temperatures at which we store or incubate our samples are specified and must be recorded to meet the quality control program. The grade of water we use to make reagents or standards has to be of a certain quality. The frequency with which we calibrate our meters, probes, and spectrometers is all part of our quality assurance program.”
But Leimbacher also spends much of her time in the field, as the Utility’s Pretreatment Coordinator. Because it’s not simply human waste being carried away to the plant. It’s any number of other pollutants used in commercial and industrial processes whose limits are specified by Town Code: Arsenic, copper, lead, mercury, silver, and zinc, to name just a few.
“I conduct routine inspections and sample at our significant industrial users and, per our NIPDES permit, complete an annual IDEM Pretreatment Program Report,” Leimbacher says. “I also monitor food industry grease traps and do grease trap sizing for new establishments.”
Utility Superintendent Dave Ryan couldn’t be more pleased with Leimbacher’s Class IV certification. “I’m elated by Leah’s accomplishment,” Ryan says. “It’s a notable professional achievement and a significant feather in her cap and I’m truly proud of her. But it’s also of great benefit to the Utility. Having a second licensed Class IV operator on staff gives us more flexibility and adaptability in our operations.”
Since her hire seven years ago, Leah has continually sought to enrich her skills and credentials,” Ryan adds. “I’m grateful for the opportunity to work with such a motivated employee.”
Utility Service Board President Larry Brandt has long been one of Leimbacher’s biggest fans. “Leah’s been here seven years and she’s had seven Lab Excellence Awards,” Brandt said. “It’s one of the best labs in the state. Good for her. Congratulations. An outstanding job.”
“I’m happy to give the Utility some of the recognition it deserves,” Leimbacher says. “What we do is often a mystery. I mean, who thinks about water after it goes down the drain? Water reclamation—preserving a fundamental resource—is an important job. Taking something that’s been used and then making it safe and useful again, especially when that something is water, is a critical public health and environmental priority.”