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If drought hits or these imported sources are reduced, we - and the generations that follow - will face a serious water crisis unless we begin looking at innovative ways to secure alternative and new sources of water.
One innovative, cost-effective and reliable alternative is the Groundwater Replenishment System, a water project that provides northern and central Orange County with a new supplemental source of safe, high-quality water.
The Groundwater Replenishment System takes highly treated sewer water and purifies it to levels that meet state and federal drinking water standards - as pure as bottled water. It uses a three-step process that includes reverse osmosis, which is used by manufacturers of bottled water, as well as microfiltration and ultraviolet light and hydrogen peroxide advanced oxidation treatment.
The water will then be used to keep the ocean out of our groundwater basin and be percolated into deep aquifers where it eventually becomes part of our natural drinking water supply. The GWR System water exceeds all federal and state drinking water standards. The underground basin provides more than half of the water used by north and central Orange County.
The Groundwater Replenishment System was built at an estimated capital cost of $485 million. The project went on line in January 2008.
The California water industry is changing. There is a movement away from the massive state and federal projects of the past. In the future, there will be more local and regional projects. We will see more water efficiency and conservation and not just during drought times. We have already begun to transfer water from agricultural areas to urban areas. There will be more use of groundwater basins to store water instead of many new reservoirs. More and more, we will reuse our water and even purify ocean water as the cost becomes competitive with other forms of "new" water.
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| Every major body of water in the nation contains some amount of purified wastewater. For the past twenty years, Californians have been drinking some reclaimed water that has been blended into our natural sources of drinking water supplies, whether it's Colorado River water, Northern California water, or groundwater.
Orange County and other communities inject purified water into seawater intrusion barriers, where it blends with groundwater. The groundwater is then pumped out and piped to homes and businesses. In areas of Los Angeles County, as well as many areas throughout the country and the world, reclaimed water has been used to recharge groundwater basins for decades.
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