Eagle River WSD GHG Baseline Inventory

Eagle River Water and Sanitation District (ERWSD) provides water and wastewater utility services to communities in Eagle County, Colorado. Its service area encompasses a high-altitude, mountainous region that is a popular tourist destination with unique challenges. One of these challenges is environmental stewardship, which is also one of ERWSD’s core values. To that end, Carollo was contracted by ERWSD to develop a comprehensive greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions baseline inventory to quantify the GHG emissions generated by their facilities and operations with an eye towards potential reduction opportunities. Carollo created an inventory tool for each of their major systems: drinking water treatment and distribution, wastewater collection and treatment, and vehicle fleet.

Aside from calculating the baseline GHG emissions, the long-term vision for the inventory tools is to serve as an annual GHG tracking tool that can be amended and expanded as operations and facilities evolve. With this in mind, Carollo also developed and conducted an inventory training workshop to train ERWSD staff on how to make modifications to adapt the tool to present conditions.

With the tools now developed, ERWSD intends to use them as part of future process alternatives analyses to factor in GHG emissions when assessing potential facility upgrades. The inventory tools will serve an essential function in guiding ERWSD’s sustainability and environmental initiatives and assist ERWSD in achieving its goal as a leader in environmental stewardship.