Utilities Operation & Maintenance

What we do at Ripley Gas, Water & Wastewater:

• We handle the water distribution, gas distribution, and sanitary sewer infrastructure that enable the City of Ripley, Tennessee to distribute potable water & natural gas to our customers, and collect sanitary sewer from them.
• We ensure an adequate supply of pretreated water is readily available with sufficient pressure to meet established health department standards, and we ensure specific fire protection standards are met.
• We provide operation, maintenance and repair to the Water Distribution, Fire Protection, Gas Distribution, and Sanitary Sewer Collection Systems.
• We operate and manage our own Water Treatment Plant, and Wastewater Treatment Facilities.  We also have a utility engineer on staff to mitigate any problems that may arise within our utility system.

Our system capacity consists of the following: 

• The O&M Department maintains approximately 90 miles of pressurized water mains, approximately 8 miles of sanitary sewer force mains, approximately 56 miles of gravity sanitary sewer mains, 21 wastewater pumping stations, approximately 200 miles of pressurized natural gas mains, 6 natural gas city gate regulator stations, and 5 natural gas secondary regulator stations.
• The City of Ripley is capable of producing 3 million gallons of potable water per day and processing 2.8 million gallons of wastewater per day.
• On a average day, we pump 1.8 million gallons of potable water to customers within the City of Ripley.

Operations & Maintenance Hours: 

• Normal Operation Hours: Monday–Thursday: 7:30 a.m. to 5 p.m. and Friday: 7:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m.
• The Emergency Operations hours are twenty four hours per day, seven days a week, 365 days per year. 

Some of Our duties:

• Install new water mains, water taps, sewer mains, sewer taps, gas mains, and gas services.
• Investigate and make necessary repairs to water mains, hydrants, valves, sewer mains, pumping stations, and manholes.
• Investigate and correct water quality complaints such as odor, rust, and bad taste.
• Investigate gas leak complaints and make necessary repairs to gas mains.
• Perform daily lab test for Drinking Water Quality & Wastewater Effluent Quality.
• Monitor and maintain the City’s “Capacity, Management, Operation and Maintenance” (CMOM) program which tracks sanitary sewer flows, identifies sources of inflow and infiltration (I/I) to prevent sanitary sewer overflows (SSO’s,) and help plan for future system improvements.
• Develop and prioritize the City’s gas main replacement, water main replacement and sanitary sewer replacement / rehabilitation programs and monitor the projects generated from those programs.

One Call Law:

• We will locate and mark gas, water, and sewer services on city easements and roadways to prevent damage during excavation or construction by City personnel, private citizens or agencies in accordance with the State of Tennessee’s Sunshine One Call Law.

Structure of our department:

On Call Crews: Responds to all gas, water and sanitary sewer system emergency related problems.

Service Crews:

• GAS: Install, repair, and maintain gas distribution system appurtenances including; mains, services, regulator stations, valves, pressure, and meters.
• WATER: Install, repair, and maintain water distribution/fire protection system appurtenances including; mains, services, fire protection services, valves, fire hydrants, pressure, meters, elevated storage facilities, and altitude valves.

Valve Crews: Exercises gas and water valves citywide for system maintenance. Performs “dry runs” to isolate sections of system for internal maintenance work and project/contractual work.

 

Locators: Leader receives Sunshine One Call Requests (approx. 15-30/day) and distributes copies to the pertinent City department. O&M Locators perform water distribution/fire protection, gas distribution, and sanitary sewer collection locations throughout the City’s service area. Leader also submits requests to Sunshine One Call for work to be performed by the O&M Department.

 

TV Camera Crews: Perform televised inspections of sanitary sewer mains. Identifies need for corrective work to be performed and determines location of blockages.

 

Vacon Trucks: Assist Cleaning Crew, and other O&M crews, as needed. Perform preventative maintenance cleaning of sanitary sewer gravity system and related manholes.

 

Cleaning Crew: Cleans sanitary sewer gravity mains with the use of cable drawn brushes. Applies degreasers and root elimination chemicals, as needed, to help maintain flow capacity.