However, the potential environmental impact caused by such wastewater facilities, among other concerns, has both cities on notice and their residents asking questions.
“You need to give thought to the chemicals that are released, whether they’re going to be spore forming,” Siena resident Leila Liberman said. “What is the impact down the road?”
Two-minute impact
Several cities in the northeastern Austin suburbs are working to address the increased demand for wastewater services, as the area has seen a growth in development in recent years as a result of large employers such as Samsung moving to the area.
Combined with the demand for homes and services, recent state legislation has left many of these budding developments in complicated jurisdictions or “no man’s land,” said Amanda Brown, a consultant from HD Brown Consulting representing a proposed 20-acre affordable townhouse development on Limmer Loop.
Large, densely populated municipalities can connect wastewater lines to centralized treatment facilities to support residential growth. Regulated by the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality, these type of facilities can treat millions of gallons of wastewater per day.
With communities now being built farther outside the jurisdiction of municipalities, developers are either not able to or cannot afford the cost of tying wastewater services into a centralized treatment facility.
Consequently, Hutto City Manager James Earp said developers on the outskirts of Hutto and Round Rock have opted for package plants. The area has now seen at least eight proposed package plants.
Round Rock Mayor Craig Morgan attributes the increase in package plants throughout the area to Senate Bill 2038—passed into law in October 2023—which allows landowners and developers to remove themselves from a city’s ETJ.
“When they [disannex], you’re going to have developers, like this, that have no option. ...the only option they’re going to have moving forward are package plants,” Morgan said. “... This isn’t just in the Hutto, Round Rock area; it’s everywhere. If there’s vacant land around you, this is going to be the wave of the future.”
Below is a map of package plants that have either been proposed or have received the appropriate permits.
What is a package plant?
Package plants are small wastewater treatment facilities, often servicing housing developments built outside of a city’s wastewater Certificate of Convenience and Necessity, or CCN.
A CCN identifies the organization responsible for providing and maintaining specific utility services, such as wastewater, according to city of Hutto documents. Without a CCN, no entity is responsible for providing wastewater services to a proposed development site.
Property owners must obtain a permit from TCEQ to operate a package plant facility on their land.
Package plants are often pre-manufactured and arrive as one complete system ready to be installed. Earp compared them to mobile homes.
“They haul them in on a trailer [and] they drop them off,” he said.
Operators must comply with specific discharge and effluent standards and are required to submit monthly water quality reports. Depending on the size, the treatment facility and equipment is inspected between every 2 to 5 years, according to TCEQ.
Some context
The issue of package plants in the area arose in 2022, when developer 705 Limmer Loop JV proposed a wastewater plant for its 200 townhome units planned for the property near Hutto ISD’s Veterans Hill Elementary School.
In October 2023, a month after Senate Bill 2038 went into effect, the landowners submitted a petition to remove the property from Hutto’s ETJ. The city of Hutto denied the developer’s petition, contrary to state law, and subsequently joined a multicity lawsuit against the state challenging the bill.
Then in April, Hutto City Council voted to begin conversations with the city of Round Rock to navigate the issue, as the property lies at the juncture of the two cities’ ETJ borders. After Round Rock City Council approved a service agreement to tie the housing project into its existing wastewater line, the developer officially withdrew its petition to disannex from Hutto’s ETJ on June 27.
More details
The city of Hutto is tracking the permitting for several proposed package plants surrounding the city limits. Council members have also made it a priority to limit these types of wastewater facilities near neighborhoods.
City staff members are concerned about the upkeep of these facilities. Package plants are not built to the same standards as regional wastewater systems, Earp said, because the materials used to build them don’t have the same level of longevity as a regional treatment facility.
Local environmental advocates also oppose the package plants. Virginia Parker, executive director of the San Marcos River Foundation—a river quality advocacy group—said the effluent water discharged can include nitrogen and phosphorus.
These chemicals, Parker said, can lead to the growth of algae blooms, which decrease oxygen and can kill fish—an ecosystem disruption. Algae blooms can also be toxic for people and animals.
Some of the benefits of package plants, according to city officials and developers, include:
- Require a lower initial investment
- Have reduced operating costs
- Are pre-assembled and typically mobile
- Customizable for the specific development
- Often require less maintenance than larger regional plants
- Potential for treated water to be reused, such as for irrigation
- The odor associated with package plants
- Proximity to homes
- Decreased property value
- The potential of a spill from the plant near homes
- Health risk of the dumping of effluent
To contest a proposed package plant with TCEQ, an individual must be an “affected party,” or a landowner within 1 mile downstream of the discharge point, as well as have a reasonable connection between their personal interests and the plant.
Typically, mediation from the developer is sought, but if no settlement is reached an official case hearing begins.
“It may be one of those things where any one package plant ... isn’t that big of a deal. But when you start multiplying the number of plants by tens and hundreds, it’s sort of like death by a thousand cuts,” Earp said.
Though these proposed sites may not be within city limits, Earp urges homeowners to reach out to local municipalities for direction in addressing their concerns.
The process for complaints or to contest TCEQ permitted package plants is as follows:
- Developer submits an application to TCEQ.
- TCEQ mails public notice to surrounding landowners.
- The public has 30 days to submit comments to the TCEQ chief clerk.
- A notice of the reviewed application is published in a local newspaper.
- The public has another 30 days to request a meeting or case hearing.
- A date and location is set by TCEQ for the public meeting.
