The county’s water treatment authority, DELCORA, and Aqua Pennsylvania Wastewater are considering a merger to help the authority with expensive U.S. Environmental Protection Agency regulations, writes Kathleen Carey for the Daily Times.

The two are entering six weeks of negotiations.

“Over the last year, I’ve kind of been looking at different options for the authority what we could explore and see if we could come up with any ideas on how to defray these costs to the residents of Delaware County,” said DELCORA Executive Director Robert Willert.

At the same time, Aqua officials are looking to expand wastewater operations.

An estimated 130 DELCORA employees would retain their jobs in the merger and the ratepayers’ fees would remain the same.

In the proposed partnership, Aqua Pennsylvania Wastewater would assist DELCORA with its financial obligations, rate stabilization for customers, engineering planning and execution of capital projects, and it would have access to capital to help comply with environmental regulations.

DELCORA would provide employee expertise as Aqua grows its wastewater business.

DELCORA faces $300 million to $600 million in upgrades over the next 25 years to comply with EPA regulations to fix storm overflow issues.

Read more about the proposed merger here.

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