USACE Galveston District awards $1.8 million contract for placement area dewatering

Published July 23, 2015

GALVESTON, Texas (July 23, 2015) – The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Galveston District awarded a small business contract in the amount of $1,857,410, to Affolter Contracting Company Inc., for dewatering of the Mid Bay Dredged Material Placement Area in Chambers County, Texas.

"Dewatering allows for the outflow of excess water which helps to consolidate material within the site and increase the placement area's capacity to hold more dredge material from the Houston Ship Channel for future dredging contracts," said Tricia Campbell, an operations manager with the USACE Galveston District's Navigation Branch. "This process is part of the district's Disposal Area Management Practices (DAMP) which ensures placement areas are prepared for future dredging activities."

Dewatering contracts are a key component of the Corps' overall management of dredged material placement areas. Each year, the USACE Galveston District dredges approximately 30 to 40 million cubic yards of material from Texas channels to fulfill its mission of keeping waterways open for navigation and commerce (benefiting 28 ports handling 500 million tons of commerce annually).

Work is scheduled to begin August 2015 with an estimated completion date of March 2016.

The USACE Galveston District was established in 1880 as the first engineer district in Texas to oversee river and harbor improvements. The district is directly responsible for maintaining more than 1,000 miles of channel, including 250 miles of deep draft and 750 miles of shallow draft as well as the Colorado River Locks and Brazos River Floodgates.

To learn more about dredging along the Texas coast, view our four-minute video, http://bit.ly/KLZQBM. For more news and information, visit www.swg.usace.army.mil. Find us on Facebook, www.facebook.com/GalvestonDistrict or follow us on Twitter, www.twitter.com/USACEgalveston.


Release no. 15-042