Brightstorm Projects
Improving water quality in Chesapeake Bay
In 2021, with the Chesapeake Bay as a backdrop, Brightstorm completed a Maryland project to retrofit three Walmart-owned stormwater ponds with new technology that improves the quality of the water flowing from them, reduces flood risk, and restores natural hydrology.
This project began in response to the 2010 U.S. EPA-established Chesapeake Bay Total Maximum Daily Load (TMDL)—a historic and comprehensive “pollution diet” to restore clean water in the Chesapeake Bay and the region’s streams and rivers.
Chesapeake Bay Takeaways:
- Brightstorm retrofits existing stormwater ponds at Walmart stores in Maryland
- Pond retrofits capture more pollution and reduce flood risk, creating excess water quality credits
- MDOT purchases excess credits from Brightstorm instead of building new assets
In order to meet their regulatory obligations, the Maryland Department of Transportation (MDOT) became the nation’s first Department of Transportation to purchase water quality credits derived from making existing infrastructure smarter. To make this happen, Brightstorm provided MDOT a complete, turn-key solution for compliance via credit generation and assumed responsibility for the finance, design, build, operations, and maintenance of its credits over a 20-year timespan—at a fixed price.
The partnership also helped Walmart improve the sustainability of its operations, while providing measurable and meaningful water-related benefits to the surrounding community.
Brightstorm allows us to deal with an acre of stormwater runoff for less than $40,000. The traditional approach cost us $150,000 an acre. So, this is going to save taxpayers tens of millions of dollars.
— Pete Rahn, former secretary of the Maryland Department of Transportation
Continuously monitored and adaptively controlled
At Walmart’s ponds, Brightstorm installed sensors, actuated valves and cellular web gateways, which are operated remotely by cloud-based software. These tools analyze weather forecasts, prepare for incoming runoff during storm events by drawing down pond levels, and manage discharge during wet weather.
Combined, the three ponds treat runoff from more than 80 acres of impervious surface. These smart ponds are now discharging approximately 77 percent less sediment, 60 percent less phosphorous and 39 percent less nitrogen into local streams and ultimately Chesapeake Bay.
