The City of Harker Heights is addressing a wastewater overflow that occurred overnight at the City’s sewer treatment facility on Pecan Drive.
At approximately 9:30 p.m., the facility experienced a power surge that caused the plant’s Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition (SCADA) system to go offline. The SCADA system monitors and operates the entire treatment process and also sends alert notifications to staff as needed. Due to being offline, the plants systems did not operate, nor send alerts, resulting in a wastewater overflow of 726,250 gallons into South Nolan Creek. For context, the facility typically processes about 2.12 million gallons per day. The Trimmer wastewater station diversion remained active and operational during the incident, helping to reduce the overall impact.
Upon discovery of the issue with the SCADA, City staff immediately restored operations and began response protocols at 6:15 a.m. The City promptly notified the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality – Region 9 Waco (TCEQ) and submitted the required Notice of Spill Report and Unauthorized Discharge Report. All required testing, reporting, and notification procedures were conducted including dissolved oxygen levels taken in South Nolan Creek. Dissolved oxygen levels are normal with no adverse impacts noted in South Nolan Creek.
City staff, along with SCADA system support personnel, are actively investigating the cause of the incident. The City is also evaluating system improvements to help prevent similar occurrences in the future. One point of failure already identified was a new uninterruptible power supply (UPS) for the SCADA system that did not operate appropriately. This UPS unit has already been replaced this morning. Cleanup efforts and additional notifications are ongoing.
The City of Harker Heights is committed to maintaining the reliability of its infrastructure and to responding quickly and responsibly when issues arise. We will continue to provide updates as more information becomes available.
For additional information you may contact Assistant City Manager, Mark Hyde at 254-953-5600 or by email at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..