December 18, 2023

Two Projects Win ‘Best Project’ Awards from ENR Texas & Louisiana

ENR Texas & Louisiana unveiled the winners of the 2023 ‘Best Project’ awards, and two Freese and Nichols projects made the list. Read the digital issue here.

Best Water Environment Project

Village Creek Facility Biosolids Management and Beneficial Reuse Project, Fort Worth, Texas

Freese and Nichols Project Manager Chad Simmons; Tyler Raughton, Archer Western; and Bala Vairavan, Synagro; at the Dec. 13 ENR Awards Ceremony in Houston

The Fort Worth Village Creek Water Reclamation Facility (WRF) Biosolids Processing Facility is a $59 million project with several “first of its kind” innovative aspects, including the largest rotary drum dryer in the world in a biosolids application, a condensate water recycling system and a nitrogen generation system that increases the safety of the facility. It provides an innovative and sustainable solution by converting wastewater treatment residuals, producing up to 110 tons of biosolids per day, for uses such as fertilizer and soil amendment.

Freese and Nichols served as a subconsultant to Synagro Technologies, Inc. for the project which received the Gold Medal for Water and Wastewater in the ACEC Texas 2023 Engineering Excellence Awards and the 2023 Ronald B. Sieger Biosolids Management Award from the Water Environment Association of Texas (WEAT). The project has also been presented at local, regional and national conferences.

Read the full ENR project feature.

The Biosolids Processing Facility has reduced the tonnage of biosolids hauled to land application sites for beneficial reuse by fourfold over the previous process.

The facility is a complex system that required an integrated design to separate, manage and treat the incoming feedstock of digested sludge into liquids, solids and gas streams.

The rotary drum dryer provided for the project is the largest rotary drum dryer in the world in a biosolids drying application.

Best Landscape/Urban Development Project

Memorial Park Central Connector, Houston, Texas

Almost double the size of New York’s Central Park, Memorial Park is the largest green space in Houston and spans 1,500 acres within the nation’s fourth-most-populous city. The City of Houston completed its latest addition to the ten-year, $205 million plan for Memorial Park in early 2023: a pair of land bridges that provide a safe and scenic way to access the whole park without walking across the six-lane Memorial Drive.

Freese and Nichols served as a subconsultant to Ardurra Group, LLC for the Central Connector project, designing a 4,000-foot natural channel system, which passes under the improvements to Memorial Drive, and an expansive prairie ecosystem where new trails and park features were created. Together, the channel and prairie serve as detention for the project’s improvements and regrading/redirection of discharges. Not only do the stream and prairie restorations preserve the native habitat, but they also improve stormwater drainage, mitigate flooding and improve the City of Houston’s flood resilience.

Read the full ENR project feature.