Kline’s Island Wastewater Treatment Plant

LCA’s CEO Featured on Good Morning Lehigh Valley

Liesel Gross discusses infrastructure upgrades, the role of our treatment plants, stormwater vs. sewer, and more. Our CEO Liesel Gross took to the airwaves recently to talk about all things water on “Good Morning Lehigh Valley,” a new radio show hosted by former Lehigh County Commissioner Brad Osborne. To hear the entire interview, please click…

See You Later, Alligator!

You may recall that back in April, two of our crew members rescued a baby alligator that found its way onto the pre-treatment screens at our Kline’s Island Wastewater Treatment Plant. The pint-sized reptile, which measures just a little over a foot long, has been relocated to its new home, Clyde Peeling’s Reptiland in Allenwood,…

An aerial view of Lehigh County Authority's Industrial Pretreatment Plant in Fogelsville, for a post on industrial waste treatment.

Businesses Create Wastewater, Too — How Does LCA Treat That?

Above, LCA’s Pretreatment Plant in Fogelsville. Last year, we kicked off our Behind The Scenes at LCA series with a number of blog posts detailing the wastewater treatment process. Now we’re kicking off 2020 by adding to that series with a post about another important step in that process: the EPA’s Industrial Pretreatment Program. As…

Disinfection and Testing — the Final Steps in Wastewater Treatment

Over the past several months, we’ve talked about why wastewater must be treated, and detailed each step in the treatment process at Allentown’s Kline’s Island Wastewater Treatment Plant. Now we’ve come to the final treatment step: disinfection, in which we use a chlorine solution to kill pathogenic (disease-causing) microorganisms before the wastewater is released into…

How Is Liquid Waste Treated? It’s All About Biology

As part of our ongoing series explaining the wastewater treatment process, we’ve discussed how solids are removed from wastewater, how we use waste to create energy, what happens to the byproducts of treatment, and even what happens to things that should not be flushed. Now we’re going to explain what happens to the liquid waste:…

The Sludge Report: What Happens After Treatment?

If you’re a regular visitor, you’ll know we’ve been doing a series of posts explaining how wastewater is treated. In our last post, we talked about why it needs to be treated — and what happens when it’s not. Today, we’re going to discuss one of the byproducts of treatment: sewage sludge. Sewage sludge is a…

Sludge 101: How Solids Are Removed From Wastewater

Ever been curious about how water gets to your tap? Ever wonder what happens after you flush the toilet? Join us for our series of semi-regular posts in which to try to demystify the process. This is our fourth in the series. In our last post, we talked about the screening process — how we get…

Wastewater Treatment Starts with Screening Out Items That Don’t Belong

As long as everything works the way it’s intended, most of us take for granted the water and wastewater services we use every day. But have you ever been curious about how water gets to your tap? Ever wonder what happens after you flush the toilet? Through a series of semi-regular posts, we’re going to…

Clean and Green: How Waste is Turned into Energy at Kline’s Island

Did you know that bacteria are hard at work producing between 35 and 50 percent of the electricity required to treat Allentown’s wastewater? That’s because they’re helping create renewable energy used to fuel a biogas generator, which in turn supplies electricity and heat at LCA’s Kline’s Island Wastewater Treatment Plant. Here’s how it works: Biogas…

Pump it Up: The Role of LCA’s Giant Wastewater Movers

These gigantic machines are three of LCA’s six main sewage pumps, used in our wastewater treatment process. The pumps convey wastewater to the Aerated Grit chambers — the second part of the treatment process. (The first is screening, which removes larger objects — things like feminine hygiene products and disposable wipes, which shouldn’t be flushed anyway!) Aerated…