Treating wastewater used to mean one thing: get it clean and send it on. South Platte Renew goes further. The facility captures the energy and nutrients that pass through it and puts them back to work, lowering costs for ratepayers and shrinking the facility's footprint.
- Renewable energy Biogas captured during treatment fuels on-site generators.
- Nutrient recovery Recovered nutrients return to the soil as biosolids.
- Clean water Treated water is returned to the South Platte River.
1. Water arrives
Regional wastewater enters the facility from Englewood, Littleton, and connecting communities.
2. Biology works
Living treatment processes and engineered controls remove pollutants before river return.
3. Biogas powers
Methane-rich biogas can be routed into cogeneration equipment for energy recovery.
4. Nutrients recycle
Biosolids preserve useful nutrients for land application and soil health.
5. River renews
Cleaned water returns to the South Platte River for communities downstream.
Graphic is a simplified public-education aid. It avoids invented quantities and points visitors into source-backed pages and documents.
Biogas & cogeneration
As solids break down, the process releases biogas, a methane-rich fuel. Instead of flaring it off, SPR routes that biogas to on-site cogeneration equipment that produces electricity and heat for the facility. The result is a growing share of the plant's power coming from the treatment process itself, which keeps rates stable for Englewood and Littleton. Hear the team tell it themselves on the Innovation Flow episode “Squeezing Every Last Drop from Biogas”.
Biosolids program
Biosolids are the nutrient-rich, treated organic material left after the process is complete. SPR's biosolids are recycled as a soil amendment that returns carbon and nutrients to Colorado farmland, closing the loop instead of sending material to a landfill.
Learn more. A redesigned document library can make biosolids guidance, water-renewal explainers, and related PARC podcast transcripts searchable from the same result set.
Industrial pretreatment
Some of what reaches the facility comes from businesses and industry. The Industrial Pretreatment Program permits and monitors these dischargers so that what arrives at SPR is safe to treat. Restaurants and residents play a part too: keeping fats, oils, and grease out of the drain protects the whole system.
For businesses. Search fats, oils, and grease resources or start a pretreatment permit conversation through our contact page.
Performance & reports
SPR publishes its results. These documents are searchable from any page and would be delivered as tagged, accessible PDFs in the redesigned site.
- Water renewal process explainer · plain-language treatment explanation
- Interactive service map · route residents to the correct utility provider
- Fats, oils, and grease resources · prevention and takeback-event information
Make the invisible infrastructure visible
SPR's own facility photos become reusable WordPress media assets with alt text, captions, and related-content links.