Wastewater Surcharge Program
The Wastewater Surcharge Program bills business customers, in addition to regular wastewater services charges, when lab tests show they are releasing extra strength wastewater into the wastewater system. This aims to ensure fairness and equity among these businesses and demonstrates the shared responsibility between them and The City of Calgary to protect our rivers and wastewater infrastructure.
The Wastewater Surcharge Program aims to:
- Meet wastewater bylaw requirements to protect the health of our watershed.
- Identify, test, and monitor businesses that release extra strength wastewater to city wastewater system.
- Promote the importance of businesses having a pre-treatment system to treat their wastewater effluent on-site.
- Ensure surcharges reflect the cost of treating extra strength wastewater.
Wastewater surcharge testing
Periodically, two wastewater samples are collected on two separate days, at a designated wastewater manhole connected to the business. If a manhole is shared with multiple businesses, the sample taken will apply to all businesses who’s wastewater discharges into that manhole.
Samples are a composite of multiple samples taken over a period of time. Other methods can be used depending on conditions within the manhole.
These samples are analyzed for Total Suspended Solids (TSS), Biochemical Oxygen Demand (BOD) and Oil & Grease (O&G) by an accredited laboratory.
Wastewater surcharge billing
After samples are analyzed, the results are averaged and used to calculate a surcharge factor that is applied to a business’ water utility bill.
The surcharge factor is multiplied by the business’ monthly water consumption to result in the surcharge fee. This surcharge factor is used each month for a minimum of three months.
After three months, The City will collect and analyze a new set of samples. The surcharge factor will be recalculated and applied to the monthly water consumption as described above.
For manholes that are shared between multiple businesses, the surcharge fee will be calculated based on water consumption for all businesses that share that manhole.
Wastewater surcharge is billed in addition to regular wastewater charges.