Burr Ridge’s first public works director knows a thing or two about water main breaks, and has used that knowledge to help municipalities, including Burr Ridge, cut down on those costly occurrences.
Howard Heil created a water engineering company while still working for the village and has spent the last 16 years helping municipalities better deal with water pressure. The three water surge suppressors that Heil has patented as owner of Heil2O have cut main breaks for villages installing them by as much as 90 percent.
“They’re really clever ideas, but the industry is so slow to adapt to anything like this,” Heil, 72, said. “So I haven’t pushed it. I’m comfortable the way it is. I’m not going to be begging people to try something new … I’m not trying to grab the whole ball of wax because I don’t need it.”
Heil started the village’s Public Works Department in 1973 and was the first full-time employee. Part of his early responsibilities, he said, included reading the water meters for homes in the village.
“It was very, very primitive,” Heil said. “We were in a three-bedroom house behind the Ramada Inn.”
He recalls starting at 220 W. 75th St., but before his time the department was located in a church.
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“We had no property south of 83rd Street when I started and we had nothing east of County Line Road,” he said.
Prior to his arrival, Heil said, a couple of police officers were also doing snow plowing on a part-time basis.
“I built that department,” said Heil, who retired in 2003 after 30 years.
He recently presented a $5,000 check to the village, noting that he came up with the surge suppressor idea while working for the municipality.
The idea came to him while moonlighting for residents doing water heaters, sinks and other plumbing work.
“When I am working with that, I seal a lot of meters.” Heil said. “When a contractor would put a meter in, the village would always seal it. I was in a lot of houses and examined the plumbing and took calls of people who complained about noisy plumbing and so forth. I worked on this kind of stuff.”
He noted that the water mains for the Carriage Way, Woodview Estates and Braemoor subdivisions were replaced in 1990. By putting the surge suppressors in those systems when the mains were replaced, it significantly cut down on the frequency of water main breaks, the Downers Grove resident said.
Heil estimates that prolonging the life of village water mains and keeping water from being wasted through breaks has saved the village more than $3 million over the years.
He also credits his inventions with helping keep Burr Ridge’s water rate one of the lowest in the area.
Heil said the success experienced by municipalities using the surge suppressors speaks volumes.
“Hodgkins, Ill. has been has been using this for about 20 years now and they used to average from 12 to 25 breaks a year. Since they’ve been using this, they’ve never had more than one a year,” Heil said. “That’s how dramatic a decrease there is.”
His clients also include Indian Head Park, LaGrange Highlands, Clarendon Hills, Oak Lawn, Arlington Heights and Highland Hills, an unincorporated area near Lombard.
“Everybody whose using it is really impressed with how well it does work,” Heil said.
He noted that Chicago carries water out to the suburbs at a far lower pressure rate because of all the cast iron pipe that was used when the city’s water lines were installed.
“They have a lot of main breaks at 30 (pounds per square inch),” Heil said.
Most municipalities’ water pressure is between 70 and 85 PSI.
Chicago sends the water to Bedford Park, which pressurizes it and sends it to suburban municipalities, which put it in a wet well and then pump it out to the pressure they want, Heil pointed out. Because Chicago does not have any elevated tanks, the water sent to the suburbs has to free-fall and be pumped again. Without pumping the water again, Heil said, a vacuum could be created and the water contaminated.
“I thought so many times it would be so efficient — but water and electric are still too cheap — where the water comes into the plant in Burr Ridge instead of just letting it free-fall, you get that turned with a turbine and create power, electricity. You could save a lot of money.”
Kevin Beese is a freelance reporter for Pioneer Press