California Water News Daily Your Source For Water News in California
The Water Replenishment District of Southern California (WRD) has signed a deal with J.F. Shea of Walnut to build its $110 million Groundwater Reliability Improvement Project (GRIP)/Advanced Water Treatment Facility (AWTF). The recycling plant is located in Pico Rivera.
When the project is completed in 2018, the WRD’s two groundwater basins, the Central and West Coast Basins, will be entirely replenished with captured stormwater ad recycled water. Much of it will be purified by the GRIP’s facility for safe and reliable groundwater replenishment.
With Shea, the 55-year-old replenishment district will construct a last-stage water treatment plant. It will treat wastewater from pretreated water from the Los Angeles County Sanitation District’s San Jose Creek Water Reclamation Plant near Whittier and conveyed along the river’s edge. The water – which was originally wastewater from toilets, showers and sinks — will be treated at the Pico Rivera plant to a purification level of distilled water, according to WRD officials.
This is an exciting day,” said WRD Board of Directors President Willard H. Murray, Jr. “The Los Angeles region has a long and sometimes colorful history of importing water to quench our thirst. With this project WRD will be turning a corner in our water history. WRD’s future will be built on water recycling, drought-proofing our water supplies and ending our reliance on imported water. All these new developments will be great for rate-payers and for the environment.”
The project, when completed, will replace the need for 21,000 acre feet of water from Northern California and the Colorado River. This mammoth project represents the ability to serve some four million customers from 43 cities in south Los Angeles County from the central and west coast underground basins without water from elsewhere. The basins will be essentially drought proof. The recycled water will replace the need for imported waters for the first time in nearly 60 years.
Funding for the project from primarily two sources according to Robb Whitaker, WRD general manager. The district secured a $20 million grant and an $80 million low-interest loan was made available by a $7.5 billion water bond, known as Proposition 1, adopted by voters in 2014.
“This is an exciting day for the district,” said WRD Board of Directors President Willard H. Murray Jr. “We are now one step closer to building one of the most advanced water recycling plants in the world.”
The project which has been in the works for 12 years will begin construct this fall and is slated to be completed in 2018.
