Our Solution

The challenge seems daunting, but SD1 has a solution. We’ve partnered with the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the Commonwealth of Kentucky to balance the need to keep local waterways clean and safe with the need to provide affordable wastewater and storm water services in Northern Kentucky.

Clean H2O40 is SD1’s commitment to increasing our capacity to better manage the flow of wastewater and storm water in Northern Kentucky. Through a number of strategic projects specifically designed to address sewer overflows, SD1 will meet the requirements of Northern Kentucky’s amended consent decree and improve the quality of life in our community.

By the year 2040, we will:

• Completely eliminate sanitary sewer overflows in a typical year; and
• Recapture at least 85 percent of the typical-year combined system flow.  

Our strategy

Getting there won’t be easy, but we know one thing for sure – it can’t happen merely by increasing the size of our pipes. Building pipes large enough to handle even a typical year’s rainfall on their own would be physically and financially impossible.

Instead, we’re going to build a system that works smarter, not harder. We’ll use equalization tanks, detention basins and other structures to strategically store flow during heavy rains and then control how and when that flow is reintroduced into our system.

This controlled storage approach, combined with targeted upsizing of pipes, is the most cost-effective strategy to meet the requirements of our amended consent decree. 

5-Year Milestones

Our progress will be measured by the EPA and the Commonwealth at critical 5-year milestones to ensure that we are on pace to reach our Clean 2O40 goals of completely eliminating sanitary sewer overflows during a typical year and recapturing at least 85 percent of all combined sewer overflows during a typical year.

Those milestone dates are:

• July 1, 2023: At least 67 percent recapture of typical-year combined system flow and elimination of at least 20 percent of baseline typical-year SSOs
• January 1, 2029: At least 75 percent recapture of typical-year combined system flow and elimination of at least 75 percent of baseline typical-year SSOs
• July 1, 2034: At least 80 percent recapture of typical-year combined system flow and elimination of at least 90 percent of baseline typical-year SSOs
• January 1, 2040: At least 85 percent recapture of typical-year combined system flow and elimination of 100 percent of baseline typical-year SSOs