Big Creek Sewage Treatment Plant located on LECC Drive services all of the homes on Lakeside drive as well as the Holiday Beach Conservation area. It is a Rotary Biological Contactor (RBC) wastewater treatment facility with phosphorus removal, use of aluminum sulphate, effluent filtration, continuous discharge, UV Disinfection, trailer-mounted portable diesel backup generator, and wastewater pump stations. There are no septic systems to worry about at LECC. This was the first plant of its kind in Ontario and is quite remarkable. It was constructed in 2001 and was quite controversial at the time because of the lack of funding for the project. There were grants that were eventually obtained by The Town of Amherstburg to help offset the cost but a great deal of it was born by the property owners that the plant served.
The system consists of 2 separate pipes to carry the effluent. The one that is attached to our houses is fed by gravity to the pumping station that is located north of the boat ramp. From there it is pumped under pressure all the way to the plant. The Clubhouse and Caretaker’s quarters are served by a separate pumping system that is attached to the Clubhouse. There is a holding tank that contains a grinder/pump system that pumps the sewage from the clubhouse to the manhole just south of the building and just north of Lakeside Drive. From there the Clubhouse sewage travels all the way down to the boat ramp pump station to be pumped back up to the plant.
Once it reaches the plant, the effluent is spun in a huge RBC centrifuge to extract the sludge and inject air. The liquid is passed through UV lights to kill off any bacteria that may be present before being let out into the marsh.