DC Water today announced a Green Infrastructure Challenge, inviting submissions of innovative projects that use green practices to absorb rain water before it can enter the sewer or storm systems. These practices, known as green infrastructure, include installing green roofs (gardens on rooftops), rain gardens, rain barrels and pervious pavements, removing impervious surfaces and using other natural means to capture and infiltrate rain water.

This challenge will serve as a model to support DC Water’s proposal to conduct a large-scale, multi-million-dollar demonstration project in the Potomac and Rock Creek sewersheds to evaluate the feasibility of using green practices, in place of or in conjunction with “gray” engineering solutions, to capture rain water and prevent combined sewer overflows (CSOs).

“An ideal solution to CSOs would be to green the District on a scale never seen before,” commented DC Water General Manager George Hawkins. “But before we seek to alter our approach, it is imperative to analyze the affordability, sustainability and feasibility of green practices to achieve CSO reduction for improved water quality. The Green Infrastructure Challenge provides a platform to generate creative and innovative approaches to managing stormwater and a body of research that will benefit cities worldwide, regardless of whether the District ultimately moves forward with a green solution, gray solution or a hybrid of the two.”

City Administrator and DC Water Board Chair Allen Lew added, “This year Mayor Vincent C. Gray launched “The Sustainable DC Plan” – the first sustainability plan that identifies a path to making the District the healthiest, greenest, most livable city over the next 20 years. DC Water’s significant investment in innovative green infrastructure designs will propel the District towards this green goal.”

Organizations are invited to submit proposals for green designs 1) in public space, 2) on commercial and private properties, and 3) on governmental/institutional properties. Prize money will be awarded to winning designs in each category. Finalists of those winning designs will be awarded construction funding for implementation. DC Water will award multiple prizes totaling more than $1 million.

DC Water will hold an informational meeting on May 10 from 10:00 a.m. to 12:00 noon at the Kellogg Conference Hotel Ballroom, at Gallaudet University, at 800 Florida Avenue, NE, Washington, DC. To RSVP for the meeting or for more information go to: dcwater.com/greenchallenge. Submissions for the contest are due October 1, 2013.

DC Water entered into a consent decree in 2005 for CSO control highly dependent on a tunnel system for storing and conveying combined sewage for treatment at Blue Plains Advanced Wastewater Treatment Plant. In 2012, DC Water, US EPA, and the District of Columbia signed the Green Infrastructure Partnership Agreement demonstrating DC Water’s and the District’s commitment to green infrastructure.

For more information on the Clean Rivers Project, please visit www.dcwater.com/cleanrivers.