WAUSAU, Wis (WSAU) - A series of improvements to Wausau's Wastewater Treatment Plant has earned the city and a local design firm a statewide award.

Wausau and Becher-Hoppe won the State Finalist Engineering Excellence Award from the American Council of Engineers Companies of Wisconsin Monday for their work on the plant. The city installed a set of micro-turbines to the Wastewater plant in 2010 to help recapture methane gas from the facility and turn it into useable power for the plant. Another improvement added an aeration blower system to help circulate air and improve efficiency.

Those improvements are expected to save the city 900,000 kilowatt hours of power and 70 therms of natural gas each year.