St. John's Mayor Danny Breen says the city is facing a wastewater problem that will cost tens of millions of dollars to fix — and he wants more time from the federal government to do it.

Changes to federal government regulations in 2014 required cities to test the levels of suspended solids and chemical biological oxygen demand — essentially, the amount of oxygen needed for organic material to be broken down in water.

The levels found in St. John's mean the city has to build a secondary treatment facility by the end of 2020, which Breen said will cost the city about $85 million to build.

"It's a huge project for the city," he said after council's weekly meeting Monday. "It eats up a lot of the capital spending that we have available to us."

The mayor says tests were done when the wastewater treatment plant was still relatively new, and the results would be different if done now. (Sherry Vivian/CBC)

Once it's up and running, the facility will cost about $12 million a year to operate.

That would mean residential water taxes will rise by $105 by 2026 to offset that cost alone, said the mayor, who added it's not just a St. John's problem but one that will affect neighbouring Mount Pearl and Paradise.

"It would add 20 per cent to the business water rates because businesses are on a meter," Breen said.

"Given these economic times, and the situation we are in, we don't think there is a need to do this right now."

Breen said he's been working with St. John's members of Parliament Seamus O'Regan and Nick Whalen but decided to write a letter to the federal ministers responsible for environment, infrastructure and intergovernmental affairs.

Here is part of Breen's letter.

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His argument is the wastewater testing results the federal government is using are from 2013 to 2014, when the Riverhead Wastewater Treatment Plan was "relatively new."

Testing in St. John's was done at the Riverhead Wastewater Treatment Facility, said Breen, which "wasn't running at optimal level," having been operational since September 2009.

It also had problems with the digester tanks and didn't have full flow from the city at that time.

"Now that we have more some more experience and we've been running longer our levels are getting back down," said Breen.

Breen says the plant's two digesters were often operated at a reduced capacity and there were periods of time only one was operational. (Jeremy Eaton/CBC)

The mayor said if the wastewater tests had been done over the last year, the results would put them in the "medium-risk range," which would mean the city would have until 2030 to construct the secondary treatment facility.

"It's something that is definitely doable," he said.

"We certainly have the support of the provincial government and we are talking to federal members as well."

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