Hicksville Water District Wins AWWA Project of the Year Award for Treatment Plant Opened in 2022

April 28, 2023

Plant 5 Will Serve the Community for Decades to Come

The Hicksville Water District (HWD) is proud to announce that it was recently awarded the Project of the Year Award by the New York Section of the American Water Works Association (AWWA). The District was recognized for its work to complete its treatment facility at Plant 5, which began operating in March of 2022. With Plant 5 pumping high-quality water, the HWD now has eight treatment wells online for emerging contaminants, which is more than any other water provider on Long Island.

“It is an honor to have been recognized by the AWWA with this prestigious award,” said HWD Chairman William Schuckmann. “We have put a tremendous amount of effort into improving our infrastructure to account for emerging contaminant treatment over the past several years, and to have our hard work acknowledged by the AWWA is very rewarding. Plant 5 is a valuable addition to our community and we are looking forward to seeing it benefit current and future generations of Hicksville Water District residents.”

The state-of-the-art facility is equipped with two Advanced Oxidation Process (AOP) systems and four Granular Activated Carbon (GAC) filters, all of which represent the most advanced and effective water treatment technology available for the removal of 1,4-dioxane as well as PFOA and PFOS. This treatment combination is the only approved method to remove contaminants of emerging concern from the ground water to non-detectable levels. This, in turn, means that the District is constantly able to provide its residents with safe, clean drinking water every day.

The HWD has invested approximately $70 million into the installation of emerging contaminants treatment, more than $35 million of which has come from New York State grant funding. $17.6 million of that grant funding came just last year, helping the District to further offset the costs of treatment to its residents. The HWD was proactive in this treatment from the beginning, planning ahead of the inevitable standards set by regulators. It was also able to navigate supply chain issues during the COVID-19 pandemic to ensure that residents had access to high-quality water, regardless of circumstances.

The District continues to push its treatment practices further, with the installation of new AOP systems and GAC filters at its Plant 8 treatment facility set to be completed later this year.

Hicksville Water District Chairman William Schuckmann, left, and fellow Commissioners Nicholas Brigandi and Karl Schweitzer led the way in ensuring that the HWD’s award-winning Plant 5 treatment facility came online in 2022.