The Coastal Regional Commission wants Richmond Hill to feature green building strategies and minimize water demands in the city’s project to expand and upgrade its wastewater facility.

During the group’s monthly meeting Wednesday at the Richmond Hill City Center, CRC Executive Director Allen Burns updated the council on the status of two Development of Regional Impact findings, one in Riceboro and another in Richmond Hill.

In Riceboro, the sewer system capacity will be expanded from 100,000 gallons per day to its maximum of 350,000 gallons per day. The project would extend sewer service to Peter Kind Road and H. Williams Road communities in the city’s southeast end and Briar Bay Road and Shell Road communities in the southwest end. It also will expand the facility from about 15 acres to 90 acres.

The council is recommending that the project incorporate green building strategies to minimize water demands, as well as using reclaimed, treated water for irrigation instead of sending it out in a stream and into the water supply, Burns said.

“If you use it for irrigation, especially when we’re having a drought, that’s a good use of the water,” he said.

The council offered the same suggestions to the other DRI project, upgrades to the Sterling Creek Reclamation Facility in Richmond Hill. The project will expand sewage treatment capacity from 1.5 million gallons per day to 4 million gallons per day to accommodate for present and future growth, he said. The project would expand the facility’s service area from 13.2 square miles to 31.5, including unincorporated parts of south Bryan County.

Read more in the Aug. 17 edition of the News.