• Water Treatment Plant

    The 2011 $40 million upgrade to MUB’s water treatment plant has made it a state-of-the-art facility. The plant provides both conventional multimedia rapid sand filters and innovative membrane technology. Every day the plant and its staff provide 10.5 million gallons of high quality water to meet customers needs.

    What’s more, with an immediate production capacity of up to 16 million gallons of water a day and expandability of up to 24 million gallons of water a day, MUB’s water treatment plant is designed to meet the growing infrastructure needs of the Morgantown area.

    It’s important to note that MUB’s water treatment plant uses two independent sources of supply: The Monongahela River and Cobun Creek Reservoir. MUB is currently completing work on a new 370 million gallon reservoir in the upper Cobun watershed that will not just provide a pristine water source but also a true secondary water source in the event of an emergency. MUB also maintains more than 10 million gallons of treated water in storage in numerous tanks across its system.

  • Star City Waste Water Treatment Plant

    MUB recently completed an $85 million dollar upgrade of its Star City waste water treatment plant in 2022. The plant provides advanced secondary level of treatment, using both conventional activated sludge and the innovative MBR (Membrane Bio Reactor) technologies. The MBR treatment process uses the same membrane technology that our drinking water plant uses to produce world class effluent. The plant’s current treated flow average is 10 million fully treated gallons of wastewater a day with a rated capacity of 20.8 million fully treated gallons per day.

    The plant was built with future growth of the Morgantown area in mind. The plant is currently able to be expanded to 28 million gallons per day.

  • Cheat Lake Wastewater Treatment Plant

    MUB assumed operational responsibility for the Cheat Lake waste water treatment plant in the late 1990s. At that time the plant was privately owned, and the operator was unable to meet the growing needs of the area. MUB acquired the plant, and with a $10 million project in 2000, upgraded the plant and expanded its service area to include most of the Cheat lake region.

    The Cheat Lake plant is a completely independent facility from MUB’s Star City wastewater treatment plant. The current capacity of the Cheat Lake plant is 750,000 gallons per day, serving more than 3,200 customers. The plant provides a secondary level of treatment, using extended aeration technology.

  • Water and Wastewater Treatment Management

    MUB utilizes a complex system called SCADA (Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition) to monitor and manage all components of the water and waste water treatment process. This system allows operators to make changes to treatment processes in real time, monitor the water system (water tanks levels and outputs, chemical conditions, etc.) and alerts staff when any current condition varies from normal operating ranges. SCADA also monitors Monongalia River quality and shares that information with other water utilities up and down the river.

  • Water, Sewage, and Stormwater Components

    As part of its overall system, MUB manages an extensive network of water, sewer, and storm facilities.

    The water system is comprised of 458 miles of pipe ranging up to 36 inch in diameter. It has 38 storage tanks with a combined capacity of more than 22 million gallons, serving 42 pressure zones. Each pressure zone is independently mastered metered.

    The sanitary sewer system is comprised of 383 miles of gravity sewer pipe ranging up to 60 inches in diameter. Much of the sewer system is combined (receiving both sanitary wastes and stormwater), and there are 39 regulated CSO’s (Combined Sewer Overflows). The system also has 84 sewage pumping stations, with force mains ranging up to 36 inches in diameter.

    The storm sewer system includes 105 miles of storm pipe of varying sizes and shapes, and nearly 4000 inlets. It also includes an undetermined number and length of ditches and streams which combine with the hard infrastructure to provide a complete storm network.