Att_12_Approach_Solicitation_No._BPM006379_GLA.pdf

Request for Proposal

Solicitation No. BPM006379

Capacity Development/Technical Assistance to Small Public Drinking Water Systems

Arizona Department of Environmental Quality (ADEQ)

1110 W. Washington Street

Phoenix, AZ 85007

Solicitation Attachment – Method of Approach | Revision No. 1 | Revised 11-22

Attachment 12 – Method of Approach

The Offeror shall provide a narrative response to each question that demonstrates their understanding of the Scope of

Work requirements and describes the company’s overall method of approach for providing the Service(s) stated in this

Solicitation. If there is a question that is not applicable to the Services required by the Scope of Work, you may mark it

“N/A”. The narrative should not contain language used for marketing purposes.

Offeror shall provide a response either after each question or in a separate document entitled: “Attachment 12 -

Method of Approach.” If a separate document is used, please clearly designate each section and double-check to ensure that each question has been answered. If any information provided is considered CONFIDENTIAL by

Offeror, the information must be specifically included in the Confidential Information Designation Attachment and related documentation to be assessed for confidential treatment under A.A.C. R2-7-103. Response to Method of

Approach shall not exceed ten (10) pages.

Question 1: How would your approach for a project differ working for a very small community or utility as opposed to a medium or large city or utility?

Offeror Response:

Small communities face many challenges that medium and large utilities do not. Many times, staff and financial resources are extremely scarce. Personnel wear many hats and have little to no backup leaving them little time to meet with consultants, work on capital planning, etc. In addition, some small rural communities face technological challenges, like unreliable cellular or Internet service, making “virtual” meetings challenging.

Our experience with small communities is that in-person meetings are critical especially at project kickoff and for milestone reviews. It may not be practical for small communities, for example, to electronically mark up a pdf and send it back to us. We may want an in-person meeting where we conduct an “over-the-shoulder” review, explaining the design and asking for concurrence or feedback.

Also, wherever possible we look for the most economical solution while keeping the overall value in mind. We seek to design solutions that are appropriate for the level of sophistication and resources that the community can provide. An example might be the level of water or wastewater treatment. While required levels of treatment are dictated by regulations and site-specific conditions, we are conscious of the fact that more sophisticated treatment methods require more sophisticated operators and high levels of certification. We seek to collaborate with community members in designing solutions that fit their particular situation and constraints while meeting regulatory requirements.

Offeror shall respond to question #2, if proposing to provide services for one or more of the following deliverables:

5 - Design of water system improvements

7 - Drinking water permit applications (e.g., ATC, AOC, APP, AZPDES)

11- Preparing Corrosion Control Assessments & Treatment Recommendations

Question 2: What is your process when designing and permitting a drinking water treatment system? How would you approach the design & permitting of a treatment system for a small public water system? Describe the steps that you take to select the best treatment technology.

Arizona Department of Environmental Quality (ADEQ)

We provide a typical Scope of Work for designing and permitting a water treatment system for a small community below.

1. Project Kickoff Meeting – GLA will meet with the utility representatives and ADEQ staff to initiate the project, review objectives, make introductions, and establish lines of communication. We want to confirm the expectations of the stakeholders from the very beginning of the project.

2. Data Collection and Review – We collect pertinent information that could include permits, as-built drawings of the water system and treatment (if existing), water quality information, water demand information and rhetorical information from utility staff. Many times, we conduct water quality sampling to augment and update historical water quality information and establish the raw water quality that needs to be treated. The finished water quality must meet Safe Drinking Water

Standards and federal and state maximum contaminant levels (MCLs).

3. Basis of Design Report – We typically prepare a Basis of Design (BOD) Report, to establish and document the basis of design before starting preparation of plans and specifications. The BOD report will summarize the data collection effort, present alternatives if appropriate, compare the alternatives and recommend a solution, include preliminary equipment selections and site plans and floor plans, include a preliminary process flow diagram and Engineer’s Opinion of Probable

Cost. This document is a tool for discussion with the utility and ADEQ so that stakeholders understand the considerations and can participate in the selection of the most appropriate solution. We will issue a draft report, have a review meeting to discuss the report and confirm recommendations, and then finalize the report as we begin the design.

Selecting the best treatment technology involves identifying the best suited technology for the constituent to be removed.

If there is more than one constituent requiring removal, this can require more stages of treatment (i.e., physical removal with chemical treatment, etc). Some projects for which we have evaluated treatment technologies include:

• Acoma Business Enterprises – This tribal utility treats water from wells of varying quality. A number of secondary contaminants exceed recommended levels including total dissolved solids, iron, and manganese. The utility currently uses reverse osmosis for removal of these constituents down to acceptable levels. We evaluated possible blending to achieve better water quality and found that blending alone could not achieve their objectives.

So, we identified a green sand filtration which, when added to the reverse osmosis process, would achieve the desired results. This also extended the life of the filters, which are very expensive to replace.

• For French Mutual Domestic Water Consumers Association, we evaluated options to control disinfection byproduct (DBP) formation. They receive treated surface water from another utility, and due to water age and chlorine disinfection, they have had many violations in the past for DBPs. We examined alternatives including aeration in their water storage tank, ammonia addition at the surface water plant, or ammonia addition at their booster station. Due to the cost of extending electrical service to their tank and the unwillingness of the bulk water provider to incur costs for plant improvements, the ammonia addition was chosen.

• For the Village of Upper Moenkopi on the Hopi reservation in Arizona, we designed a reverse osmosis treatment plant to remove high TDS down to acceptable levels in a well that is drilled into the deeper aquifer for the area.

Shallower wells have lower production.

• For the Hopi Junior/Senior High School, we designed a treatment system with adsorption for arsenic removal followed by reverse osmosis for high TDS. This school is served by three wells with varying water quality.

The steps we would follow to identify the best treatment technology are:

• Perform a literature review to see if bench tests and comparisons of treatment alternatives has been done by others. For example, for certain constituents such as arsenic, there have been many studies done in the past that demonstrate which technologies are proven to perform the best.

Arizona Department of Environmental Quality (ADEQ)

• From a literature review and from our own experience, identify treatment technologies suitable for the removal of the constituent(s) required.

• Contact manufacturers for performance data and equipment costs.

• Develop Engineer’s Opinions of Probable Cost (EOPC) based on equipment costs plus installation, plus a building or enclosure if required.

• Develop operating and maintenance (O&M) costs that include utilities (e.g., electricity), chemicals, labor and replacement costs.

• Compare treatment technologies if applicable on the basis of cost and non-cost factors. These factors will include efficacy of treatment, capital costs, O&M costs, sophistication, size of footprint, and other factors that may be important to the utility.

• Prepare a matrix for comparison. The matrix could be based on numerical scores, or simply a list of “pros” and

“cons”.

• Meet with utility representatives to discuss the evaluation and select the best approach.

4. Design – We typically prepare milestone deliverables for review and comment at 60% and 90% completion. The BOD

Report represents a 30% design, and includes typical site plans and floor plans showing equipment layouts. The design package includes plans, technical specifications, “front end” contractor documents, and EOPC.

5. Permitting – All public water systems in Arizona must submit an Approval to Construct application to ADEQ with attachments including the design report and final plans and specifications. We have experience with this process. After construction is complete and before improvements are put into service, the engineer applies for Approval of Construction on behalf of the utility. The AOC attachments include record drawing, quality testing (bacT, disinfection), O&M manual and application form.

In addition to permitting from ADEQ, there may be local permitting requirements such as building permits.

Question 3: How will you ensure your proposed solution to the assigned task is practical, cost-effective, and sustainable for the small water system?

We have extensive small community experience and are sensitive to solutions that are practical, cost-effective and sustainable. While we strive to keep construction and ongoing O&M costs low. We know that the price of producing water that meets federal standards rises as the water quality standards become more stringent. We can help utilities with capacity building and utility management from water audits to identify lost water and associated lost revenue, to rate studies to identify the real cost of operating the utility.

To ensure that solutions are practical, we want to choose proven technologies, from reliable vendors, who provide adequate support to their customers. We strive for cost-effectiveness by not “over-designing”, thoughtfully considering the impacts of the technology on the utility operation both from a capital and an ongoing recurring cost standpoint.

Sustainable solutions are those that fall within the utility’s technological and financial capabilities.

Offeror shall respond to question #4, if proposing to provide services for one or more of the following

5 - Design of water system improvements

7 - Drinking water permit applications (e.g., ATC, AOC, APP, AZPDES)

11- Preparing Corrosion Control Assessments & Treatment Recommendations

Arizona Department of Environmental Quality (ADEQ)

Question 4: When designing a treatment system that modifies water chemistry, how do you ensure this treatment won’t cause or exacerbate other water quality problems?

Our firm employs geochemists who can perform modeling to identify consequences of changing water quality through treatment. With a comprehensive analysis of the raw water quality and an understanding of the treatment process, our geochemists can assure that treatment will not cause or exacerbate water quality problems.

Questions 5: How will you ensure that project(s) stays on schedule and is(are) completed on-time as per the task order offer/award?

If a project is not on schedule, describe what steps will be taken to get the project back on track?

If your team is backed up or unavailable to finish a job, describe what steps will be taken to get the project delivered on time?

If your subcontractor is falling behind stated deliverable, describe what steps will be taken to get the project on track and delivered on time?

We manage to the schedule, by creating a baseline schedule when preparing our scope of work and fee estimate, and updating that schedule with actual dates as the project progresses. The schedule is shared with the client throughout the project because the client effects the schedule by completing timely reviews, and providing needed information and decisions throughout the project.

If the project is not on schedule, we correct by addressing the root cause of the slippage. If needed, we identify additional resources throughout our company. If the cause is delays in receiving critical data from the client, we communicate our information needs.

When our staff is backed up or presently unavailable, we have extensive resources throughout the company that we can draw upon if needed to ensure that we finish the job. However, given that we much prefer not to change team members in the middle of a project.

We try to prevent our subconsultants from falling behind by providing them the information they need to do the job in a timely manner, and clearly communicating deliverable dates. We provide them an internal deadline to us that provides adequate time for use to review and incorporate their work, if required, before submitting to the client. We also check in regularly. Using these methods, we have not experienced our subconsultants missing deadlines to use, and if we were to experience delays with a new subconsultant, we would likely opt for an alternative firm in the future.

Question 6: Describe your company’s review process to ensure that technical documents are complete and accurate prior to submission to ADEQ. What documents can ADEQ review to verify if the review was completed? If

ADEQ finds an issue, who, other than the PM, is the point of contact for resolution?

We maintain a corporate Quality Management Plan. On a project basis, we identify the best reviewer for the deliverable, schedule the review to coincide with the deliverable data and document the review with our QC checklist. Depending on the document, we maintain a record of reviews that might include a Calculation Cover Sheet, or pdf review comments in a pdf document. These documents are available for review by ADEQ.

Our project team includes a Principal-In-Charge (PIC). Part of this team member’s responsibility is ensuring that our clients are satisfied with our work. The PIC for this project is Doug Bartlett, Vice President in our Scottsdale office.

Arizona Department of Environmental Quality (ADEQ)

Question 7: Describe a time where obstacles faced during a project resulted in a change to your methodology of approach. What were the obstacles, the impact to the project and what did you do to overcome them?

On two current projects, our original scope of services was to design improvements to treatment facilities. However, once we conducted our initial site visit and inspection, it became obvious that the treatment facility was not operating as designed. In these instances, we re-grouped with the client, and prepared a revised approach to the project that included conducting a full system evaluation to include operational considerations. In other words, we expanded our attention to include potential changes in operation and/or minor equipment replacements. These often low-cost modifications can improve plant performance and potentially increase the capacity of the treatment system prior to adding to the process.

The impacts to these projects are that the operators better understand the facilities that they are responsible for, and have the tools they need to improve performance and now the design can focus on planning for the future. There are potentially tremendous cost savings to this approach, by making operational changes rather than adding tanks or treatment equipment.

Offeror shall respond to scenario #1, if proposing to provide services for one or more of the following

4 - Construction Administration & Construction Management

5 - Design of water system improvements

7 - Drinking water permit applications

8 - Funding Assistance

9 - Legal assistance (e.g., forming corporate status, corporate documents)

10- Median Household Income Surveys

12 - Preparing Environmental Documents/Archeological Surveys

13 - Preparing Preliminary Engineering Reports (PER)

14 - Rate studies, rate reviews, rate cases

16 - System Evaluations

19 - Water Quality Compliance Options

Scenario 1: A small, rural public water system has multiple water quality issues. There are 20 current connections;

the customers are low income and/or retirees. All the homes are on septic systems. The system consists of one well (located within the floodway of a major river), an elevated storage tank and distribution system.

The water system has maximum contaminant level (MCL) exceedances for uranium. In addition, chloride, sulfate, total hardness and total dissolved solids are well above the secondary MCLs. Sampling of private wells in the area indicated better water quality may be found away from the river. Outline at least three alternatives to address the water quality issues that are cost effective and sustainable for this very small water system. Provide your recommendation for the best alternative for the system.

For your recommendation include the following information for this scenario:

A bullet list of tasks that your firm would conduct to address the water quality issues and implement a solution. The tasks should be presented in the order they would be conducted. Each task should include the purpose of the task (e.g., why are you doing it? What information will be obtained in doing the task? What other information would be included in your summary recommendation report to ADEQ?

Arizona Department of Environmental Quality (ADEQ)

Offeror Response (limit response for scenario #1 to two (2) pages):

Our approach to this project would be to perform the following tasks:

• Conduct a project kickoff meeting to discuss goals and expectations. Purpose: make sure the project team is aligned on goals and define roles/responsibilities and lines of communication.

• Determine whether an alternate water source might be a better option than treatment. Based on the presence of uranium, chloride, sulfate, total hardness and TDS, reverse osmosis treatment is likely the only solution and will generate a waste stream that will be challenging to dispose of. An alternative source of supply might be drilling a new well, or interconnecting to a nearby system. Purpose: to consider alternatives.

• Ensure that the solution is the most economical for the community. The recurring cost of treatment will be a burden to low income/retiree customers on a fixed income. The capital cost of a new source might be higher, but could potentially be grant-funded, while no funding exists for ongoing customer costs. Purpose: to consider appropriateness of the solution.

• Conduct a high-level cost comparison of options, both capital and O&M. Purpose: Conduct a life-cycle cost analysis that will aid in decision making.

If treatment is the only and/or best solution, then we would proceed with the following:

• Collect historic water quality data and decide if there is a need to collect additional water quality samples.

Purpose: Have sufficient information to characterize the raw water for design of treatment.

• Collect historic water use data, including peak demands. Purpose: Properly size the treatment system, and calculate the amount of reject water that will need to be disposed of.

• Identify treatment technologies, costs and required footprint. Purpose: Identify space/land requirements so that the property can be acquired or allocated.

• Prepare a Basis of Design Report that includes an EOPC, preliminary site plan and building footprint. Purpose:

Document the design for concurrence by the Owner and ADEQ before commencing preparation of plans and specifications.

• Prepare Detailed Design, typically 60% and 90% submittals, for review and a final signed and sealed set of documents that can be used for bidding. Purpose: Provide design documents for review and feedback by Owner and ADEQ, and incorporate comments to a final set that can be used to competitively bid the project to contractors.

The Summary Report to ADEQ will include an evaluation of alternatives, including description, footprint, capital and O&M costs, and non-cost factors that would be developed with the project team but might include the level of operator needed, land acquisition or easements needed, and the level of sophistication of the system.

Three alternatives that might be compared are: 1) treatment 2) different groundwater well, 3) interconnection to nearby water system.