By Devon Cormier
Staff Writer

The Hooksett Sewer Commission may resort to technology new to the United States in an attempt to get approval to expand the wastewater treatment plant, which has just about reached capacity.

The Department of Environmental Services denied Hooksett’s request to expand its plant a few months ago. Hooksett spent years planning and saving for a different system, leaving the sewer commission no choice but to resort to a moratorium on sewer hookups.

The DES denied the expansion plan because a 2002 study showed depleted oxygen levels in the Merrimack River, where Hooksett and a handful of other communities dump their waste. The DES said Hooksett could expand if it found a way to decrease the effluents going into the water – something only an expensive filtration system could achieve.

Now, sewer commission Chairman Sid Baines said they have come up with a plan and sent a copy to the DES. The plan involves a very advanced filtration system seen in Scandinavian countries, Baines said, but he isn’t sure how the DES will react yet.

“We’ve sent it to the state and we’ll let them fathom it and then we’ll go up and talk with them,” Baines said. “The ideas are from other countries. We have a few scenarios and laid out a pretty good plan.”

The main problem may come down to money, Baines said. The sewer commission saved about $3.5 million since 1999 that will go to what Baines calls phase one – a composting facility where solid waste will be turned into fertilizer. The com-posting plan has been in the works for some time and, after many voter rejections, should break ground in April at a location on Lehoux Drive.

After that, Baines said it will be time to figure out the funding and expansion plan for the wastewater treatment plant.

“There are all these obstacles,” Baines said. “It started with the composting and now this noncompliance obstacle for not giving us any capacity. That $3.5 million is not going to get us where we want to go.”

Baines said he hopes the $3.5 million will at least get them past phase one, at which point they can move on.

“Once the composting is behind us and we have a place to control biosolids, we’ll move onto the expansion,” said Baines. “But we need more and more money. People are knocking the door down asking for capacity but we just don’t have it.”

Baines expects to hear back from the DES within the next couple of weeks and will set up a meeting at that point. For now, no sewer hookups are available for any developments coming into Hooksett because the plant is so close to its 1.1 million gallon capacity.