Orange County Water District's Groundwater Replenishment System Tour
Sunday, November 16, 2008
2:00 p.m. - 5:00 p.m.
The Groundwater Replenishment (GWR) System is an innovative water purification project that is a result of the visionary leadership of both the Orange County Water District and the Orange County Sanitation District. The GWR System takes highly treated wastewater that would otherwise be released back into the environment, and purifies it to near-distilled water quality using microfiltration, reverse osmosis, and UV light with advanced oxidation technologies.
The GWR System is the largest water purification project of its kind in the world, and will provide 70 million gallons per day of near-distilled quality water to expand a seawater intrusion barrier and recharge the Orange County groundwater basin each year. The tour will consist of walking through the three major process areas and associated pump stations.
For your protection and comfort, please wear closed-toe shoes and pants or jeans. The tour may include climbing stairs, walking and standing for periods up to 30-45 minutes.
The Edward C. Little Water Recycling Facility Tour
Wednesday, November 19, 2008
9:00 a.m. - 12:00 p.m.
In 1992, West Basin received state and federal funding to design and build a world-class, state-of-the-art Edward C. Little Water Recycling Facility in the City of El Segundo, with its own visitor's education center. It is one of the largest water recycling facilities of its kind and is the only treatment facility in the country that produces five different qualities of "designer" or custom-made recycled water that meet the unique needs of West Basin's municipal, commercial and industrial customers. The five types of designer water include:
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Tertiary Water for a wide variety of industrial and irrigation uses;
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Nitrified Water for industrial cooling towers;
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Softened Reverse Osmosis Water: secondary treated wastewater purified by microfiltration (MF), followed by reverse osmosis (RO), and disinfection for groundwater recharge;
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Pure Reverse Osmosis Water for refinery low-pressure boiler feed water; and
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Ultra-Pure Reverse Osmosis Water for refinery high-pressure boiler feed water.
The facility produces 30 million gallons of water every day, conserving enough drinking water to meet the needs of 60,000 households for a year. The facility also houses a 60,000 square foot solar power generating system that has reduced emissions of carbon dioxide by over 356 tons in one year's time. To date, nearly a half billion dollars in local, state, and federal funds have been invested in this water recycling effort.