Environmental Engineering students evaluated decentralized wastewater treatment alternatives for three sites in Lake Delhi, a popular recreational area in Eastern Iowa, demonstrating various designs and solutions that could be considered throughout the Lake Delhi community. 

In this report, design alternatives were considered for the creation of decentralized wastewater treatment facilities for the community of Lake Delhi, Iowa. The community was flooded in 2010, prompting the construction of the new dam under the condition that insufficient wastewater treatment in the surrounding community be addressed. For that reason, the students examined three sites with little to no access to wastewater treatment. The locations each contain unique difficulties not typical of normal wastewater treatment.

Due to topographical, economic, and legal constraints, the design alternatives have been limited to small decentralized systems. Also, Lake Delhi officials have stated that the homeowner demographic will be changing because the lake has returned to its original condition prior to the flood. Since the population of full-time homeowners is expected to increase, design alternative selection was adjusted to compensate for the change. Homeowner agreement and cooperation for unified systems were considered as well. Included in the report is background information on the current treatment, potential site locations for treatment systems, as well as a comprehensive analysis of treatment alternatives using decision matrices. Among the decision matrices criteria include effectiveness, cost, operation and maintenance requirements, footprint, design longevity, and installation feasibility. Final alternatives selection were made for each site. Also, cost analysis estimations were calculated on a per homeowner basis.