CRMWD Making Progress on New Raw Water Production Facility
By: Jenne Anderson
Updated: October 11, 2012
BIG SPRING-- Construction crews are busy at work at the new Big Spring Raw Water Production Facility.
At 75% complete, Assistant General Manager Mitch Holmes says by this coming March the site will provide an additional raw water resource to customer cities hit by population booms and record setting drought conditions.
"The impact of an extended drought is pretty significant on our surface reservoirs," said Holmes. "Because up until 2 Fridays ago, our 3 reservoirs were at or near virtually empty."
Holmes says the facility's method will provide a reliable water source because the plant will purify up to 2 million gallons of sanitation water from Big Spring, and then distribute it as raw water.
"Waste water is available, it's reliable, and its treatment qualities and characteristics are very consistent," explained Holmes.
Although the water is coming from the Big Spring Sanitation Facility, the CRMWD says it's actually going to be even cleaner than the raw water they send off to the cities. That's because it's treated under a 3-part process at the production facility.
"In its most basic form it's exactly the same as the under the counter RO systems you buy at the hardware stores and then install at your house," said CRMWD Staff Engineer Kyle Krueger. "It's just a much larger scale."
The CRMWD adds that once the water is sent off to each city it will then go through another filtration process.
But after all that treatment, they say this waste water will be clean enough to drink, allowing us to recycle more of our most precious resource.
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