Water containing wastes – aka wastewater – from residential,
commercial and industrial processes requires treatment to remove
pollutants prior to discharge. After treatment, the water is
suitable for nonconsumption (nonpotable) and even potable use.
In California, water recycling is a critical component of the
state’s efforts to use water supplies more efficiently. The state
presently recycling about 669,000 acre-feet of water per year and
has the potential to reuse an additional two million acre-feet
per year.
Non-potable uses include:
landscape and crop irrigation
stream and wetlands enhancement
industrial processes
recreational lakes, fountains and decorative ponds
toilet flushing and gray water applications
as a barrier to protect groundwater supplies
from seawater intrusion
wetland habitat creation, restoration, and maintenance
… Boring has skirted building, environmental and labor
regulations, according to records obtained by ProPublica and
City Cast Las Vegas under public records laws. In June, a Clark
County official documented water spilling onto a public street
from a Boring Company worksite near the University of Nevada,
Las Vegas. The county issued a cease-and-desist letter. It
twice installed tunnels without permits to work on county
property. State and local environmental regulators documented
it dumping untreated water into storm drains and the sewer
system. And, as local politicians were approving an extension
of the system, Boring workers were filing complaints with the
state Occupational Safety and Health Administration about
“ankle-deep” water in the tunnels, muck spills and severe
chemical burns. After an investigation, Nevada OSHA in
2023 fined the company more than $112,000.
Boring disputed the regulators’ allegations and
contested the violations. The complaints have continued.
A federal judge indicated Wednesday that he’ll allow a company
operating a dysfunctional federally funded wastewater treatment
plant that dumps sewage and toxic chemicals into the Tijuana
River and the Pacific Ocean to duck a lawsuit brought by
environmental groups in San Diego. In a massive 637-page
lawsuit filed last year, San Diego Coastkeeper and the
Environmental Rights Foundation claim that Veolia Water North
America-West and the U.S. section of the International Boundary
and Water Commission have discharged billions of gallons of raw
sewage, pesticides, sediment and heavy metal industrial
pollutants like DDT and PCBs into southern San Diego County in
violation of both the Clean Water Act and the sewage treatment
plant’s operating permit.
To find chemical engineering problems to solve, William
Tarpeh uses a simple formula. “Name a wastewater, either
where it comes from or something about it. Name a pollutant you
want to get rid of, and then name a product you’d be interested
in making,” said Tarpeh, an assistant professor of chemical
engineering in the Stanford School of Engineering. This
combination has fueled Tarpeh’s interests since he was a
Stanford undergraduate. Now, it shapes his vision for finding
innovative ways to extract value from wastewater, including new
research that involves designing and refining ways to reclaim
ammonia from nitrate-contaminated wastewater streams.
The push to explore a potential Superfund designation for the
Tijuana River Valley hit a snag Wednesday when the U.S.
Environmental Protection Agency told San Diego County leaders
that the federal agency’s priority is to control the flows of
sewage and trash that spill over from Mexico. Investigating
potential contamination in the border region was best left to
the state, they said. Last week, the federal
agency denied a petition to review whether a six-mile
stretch of the lower river valley qualifies as a Superfund
site, a determination it made based largely on data from 2018
and 2019. That data, collected by the U.S. Customs and Border
Protection and the International Boundary and Water Commission,
found concentrations of hazardous chemicals in water and
sediment, but not at levels that exceeded the EPA’s regional
screening levels for human health concerns.
Tucson officials are moving forward on a plan to create
southern Arizona’s first water treatment facility that turns
wastewater into drinking water. Tucson City Councilmembers
voted to approve a proposal to use some $86 million worth of
Bureau of Reclamation funding to build the new treatment
facility and save Colorado River water as a result. Tucson
Water Director Jon Kmiec says things began about 16 months ago,
when the water utility asked the agency to fund an advanced
water purification plant in Tucson’s northwest side.
Imperial Beach Mayor Paloma Aguirre is criticizing the Biden
administration for refusing to declare an emergency regarding
the Tijuana River crisis, which has seen the dumping of
enormous quantities of untreated sewage from Mexico and into
the U.S. through the course of water. Speaking to Border
Report, Aguirre highlighted that delegations from San Diego
visited the White House three times this year with this
purpose, the last one taking place last month. However, their
requests to unlock funding to address the issue have not been
fruitful, she said.
From one end of the U.S.-Mexico border to the other, water and
wastewater infrastructure are perennial problems. In the Rio
Grande Valley, farmers are running out of time to get more
water from Mexico for their crops. In Imperial Beach,
California, residents are fed up with raw sewage flowing over
the border from Tijuana. The Colorado River states and Mexico
are haggling over limited water. In the final weeks of
Joe Biden’s presidency, the administration’s record on border
environmental issues is still up for debate. Some will remember
the record infrastructure investments that allowed many border
residents to have drinking water in their homes for the first
time. Or the agreements the U.S. struck with Mexico to share
Colorado River and Rio Grande water. Others are left with the
stench of sewage in their noses, as the flows from Tijuana into
South Bay California continue unabated and solutions are still
months or years away.
The widespread use of pharmaceuticals in America is introducing
even more toxic “forever chemicals” into the environment
through wastewater, according to a study released Monday, and
large municipal wastewater treatment plants are not capable of
fully filtering them out. The plants’ inability to remove
compounds known as organofluorines from wastewater before it
enters drinking water supplies becomes even more pronounced
during droughts and could affect up to 23 million people,
scientists wrote in an article published Monday in Proceedings
of the National Academy of Sciences. Most of the compounds
came from commonly prescribed medications including
antidepressants and statins, the researchers found.
Proposed vineyard wastewater regulations provoked a major hue
and cry among Sonoma and Mendocino growers when government
officials introduced them in 2022. On Dec. 4, 2024, state
water board officials announced a new plan they hoped would
better address growers who farm 65,000 acres of planted
vineyards–more than 10 percent of the 550,000 acres planted in
the state (see meeting slides here). But the
proposed revisions were still found wanting, locals said.
County leaders pointed out the water board itself still has not
defined standards for Russian River sediment and said vineyards
are not the ones to blame for water issues. The fault lies
instead with rural roads and the federal and Sonoma County
authorities who oversee Lake Mendocino, they said.
The cost of water in San Diego will continue to skyrocket but
we don’t have a good idea where or whether it will
stop. The city of San Diego recently revealed its own
water rates will rise a whopping 61 percent through 2029,
adding about $57 per month to the average water bill. Part of
the reason is the San Diego County Water Authority, which sells
water to the region’s 22 water districts, is paying off debt
and deals it took on many years ago to claim more Colorado
River water and tap into ocean water for drinking. Another
reason is cities like San Diego are building their own
expensive wastewater recycling systems. But this year’s
price spike – or any water rate forecast in San Diego
right now – doesn’t account for some of the largest and most
expensive water security solutions being pondered in Southern
California right now by the Metropolitan Water District of
Southern California and beyond. San Diego would also be on the
hook for those.
San Diego’s congressional delegation announced Tuesday it had
secured the remaining funding needed to upgrade the
long-neglected federal wastewater treatment plant at the
U.S.-Mexico border that has allowed sewage from Tijuana to
pollute South County shorelines. But the stopgap spending bill
that would provide the $250 million to complete the critical
repairs was scrapped late Wednesday after President-elect
Donald Trump and others urged the House of Representatives to
reject the deal, putting the fate of the plant funding in
limbo. … The South Bay facility has long been
underfunded and undermaintained. It repeatedly takes in more
sewage from Tijuana than it was designed to treat, which has
left the agency with multiple Clean Water Act violations for
releasing wastewater into the Pacific Ocean beyond what it is
permitted.
Los Angeles is taking charge of the water crisis by spending
$740 million to build a facility that converts wastewater into
clean drinking water. The Donald C. Tillman Water Reclamation
Plant in Van Nuys will produce 20 million gallons of drinking
water daily, the Los Angeles Times reported. As long as the
project stays on schedule, it will break ground this month with
an expected completion date of 2027. This major investment is
part of the L.A. Groundwater Replenishment Project approved by
the Board of Water and Power Commissioners. Recycling
wastewater isn’t a new initiative for Los Angeles. However, the
method was used for irrigation, whereas this initiative marks
the first time the county will use this sustainable method to
create more drinking water for residents.
The Tolowa Dee-ni’ Nation and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers
on Wednesday, Dec. 18, signed a ceremonial agreement that will
provide the Nation with $800,000 toward extensive improvements
to a 50-year-old wastewater system serving low-income
households at Xaa-wan’-k’wvt (Howonquet) Village and Resort in
Smith River, Calif. The Nation’s Tribal Council met with U.S.
Army Corps of Engineers representatives for a ceremonial
signing of the agreement, exchange gifts and enjoy a meal while
taking in the view of the Smith River Estuary, just a few miles
south of the California/Oregon border. Attendees discussed the
wastewater system project planned for the area as well as
Tolowa Dee-ni’ culture, history and environmental practices.
A new trash boom system is intercepting trash, plastics, tires
and other debris flowing from Mexico into San Diego’s Tijuana
River Valley, part of a state-funded pilot project to address
longstanding pollution along the border. The 450-foot-long boom
was installed in mid-November. And on Tuesday, federal, state
and local officials gathered along the U.S. side of the Tijuana
River canal to mark the next phase of the project, the capture
of objects that clog untreated water entering a treatment
plant, officials said. … The project, which will run for
two years, was financed with $4.7 million from the State Water
Resources Control Board and is overseen by the nonprofit Rural
Community Assistance Corporation, officials said.
Near the huge sewage plant that treats San Jose’s wastewater at
the southeast tip of the San Francisco Bay, wildlife biologist
Phillip Higgins peers through binoculars. … In less than a
minute, he spots what he is looking for — a small head with
large yellow eyes is poking out of a buried pipe. This is a
burrowing owl, less than a foot tall and weighing just ounces.
… Sandwiched between office buildings and the sewage plant,
this 200-acre slice of land is home to some of the last
burrowing owls in the Bay Area. They were once common, but
urbanization has paved over most of their grassland habitat. In
October, the state designated the owls as a candidate for
protection under the California Endangered Species Act. But
while burrowing owls are disappearing throughout the state, a
collaboration between biologists and the City of San Jose has
helped them maintain a talon hold on this spot. The scientists
are now working to protect the few that remain in the Bay Area
and reintroduce them to better habitats farther south. It is
part of an effort led by the Santa Clara Valley Habitat Agency
that seeks to bring the birds back from the brink.
… Major failures at the nearby Hyperion Water Reclamation
Plant dumped millions of gallons of untreated sewage into Santa
Monica Bay and released high levels of hydrogen sulfide, a gas
that smells like rotten eggs and can cause health issues. At
the time, [Tamara] Kcehowski was hopeful the facility’s
response would be swift and that her community would suffer the
stinky mess for only a few days — or at worst a few weeks. But
now, more than three years later, the noxious odors and
elevated hydrogen sulfide emissions persist, despite repeated
complaints and appeals to the city of Los Angeles, air quality
regulators and local officials. Although she’s lived in El
Segundo with her daughter since the early 2000s, she now
wonders if her only recourse is to move.
After enduring a construction ban that has lasted more than 35
years, the coastal community of Los Osos will finally be able
to build again. The Los Osos Community Plan, which has been
over a decade in the making, received its final stamp of
approval from the California Coastal Commission this week. The
massive community plan rolls back the building moratorium that
has blocked residential development in Los Osos for the last
three and half decades and provides a regulatory blueprint to
address the three main roadblocks that stunted development in
the first place — namely limited water supply,
insufficient wastewater treatment infrastructure and
environmental protections.
The Martinez Refining Company has agreed to pay $4.48 million
to settle allegations of federal Clean Water Act violations
tied to its Contra Costa County refinery, and the money will go
to environmental projects, according to the San Francisco Bay
Regional Water Quality Control Board. Owned by PBF Energy Inc.,
the refinery produces a variety of petroleum products. Between
2022 and 2023, the company allegedly discharged millions of
gallons of wastewater from its oil refinery operations, causing
harm to water quality and aquatic life in the large undeveloped
marshes connected to the Carquinez Strait.
There are new documented claims that the popular fireworks
shows over SeaWorld are polluting Mission Bay and the
surrounding beaches. San Diego Coastkeeper and the Coastal
Environmental Rights Foundation have sent a letter of notice of
intent to sue SeaWorld. The environmental advocates say the
company routinely discharges plastic caps, wires, trash and
other chemical covered debris into Mission Bay in violation of
its fireworks permit. “Our view is they are not allowed to use
this bay as a dumping ground for their fireworks shows, and as
basically a garbage dump for their poorly treated wastewater,
which they’re suppose to treat,” said Phillip Musegaas,
executive director of San Diego Coastkeeper. SeaWorld
produces approximately 150 firework displays during the year.
The shows originate with explosives being ignited from
a barge in the middle of the Mission Bay waters surrounding
Fiesta Island. It’s a popular area for beachgoers and
visitors looking to ski and paddle boat. There is also numerous
wildlife.
Gov. Gavin Newsom said Thursday that declaring the Tijuana
River cross-border sewage crisis an emergency would “have been
just a statement backed up by nothing” to address the
longstanding problem.“It would have meant nothing,” he said
when asked why he has repeatedly rejected calls from local and
state officials. … Newsom’s comments mark what many
believe is the first time he has publicly explained his refusal
to proclaim an emergency declaration. His administration has
made the case that the sewage crisis does not qualify as an
emergency under state statute. In an October
2023 letter to the state Coastal Commission, David
Sapp, Newsom’s legal affairs secretary, said the issue was a
jurisdictional one because it’s the federal government that
owns the wastewater plant – currently undergoing repairs and an
expansion – that has allowed Tijuana sewage to foul south San
Diego shorelines.
A sewage leak that has spilled an estimated 20 million gallons
of wastewater into a Contra Costa County wetland could have
considerable ecological consequences for the fish and wildlife
populations that call the Suisun Marsh home. Among the water
that runs through our sewage system is washed-out shampoo,
sudsy dish soap and remnants of medications — and all of those
can be harmful to the fish and birds, according to Sejal
Choksi-Chugh, the executive director of ecological watchdog
Baykeeper. The leak was discovered Monday, spurring repair
efforts this week, but it is believed to have started weeks
earlier. Choksi-Chugh said she worries about how the influx of
untreated water that has seeped out of the Delta Diablo
Sanitation District’s broken pipes will affect the environment.
In February of 2020, Monterey One Water’s advanced wastewater
recycling project, Pure Water Monterey, became operational
after seven years of planning, delivering 3,500 acre-feet of
water annually to the Monterey Peninsula’s Cal Am service area.
That is more than a third of the region’s annual water demand,
reducing dependence on the historically overpumped Carmel
River. In 2023, an expansion of that project broke ground that
will add another 2,250 acre-feet of recycled water to the
annual portfolio; it’s expected to come online in fall 2025.
With that date approaching, Dave Stoldt, general manager of the
Monterey Peninsula Water Management District, has been making
the rounds to various city councils apprising them of the
proposed allocations each municipality will initially get out
of the 2,250 acre-feet of water from the expansion of Pure
Water Monterey.
Jacobs started construction Monday on the $740 million Los
Angeles Groundwater Replenishment Project in the San Fernando
Valley, an L.A. Department of Water and
Power spokesperson said in an email. The Donald C.
Tillman Water Reclamation Plant will provide a
drought-resistant water source as climate change increasingly
threatens L.A.’s current supply. Once complete, the
Tillman facility will purify 25 million gallons of wastewater
daily to replenish the drought-stressed San Fernando Basin and
its aquifers. LADWP is spearheading the L.A.
Groundwater Replenishment Project in partnership with L.A.
Sanitation & Environment, with the ultimate goal of recycling
all its wastewater and expanding local water sources to 70% of
the city’s total supply by 2035. In recent years, the city has
been importing about 90% of its water, according to the Los
Angeles Times.
An underground wastewater leak that likely started weeks ago
has spilled about 20 million gallons of sewage into a Contra
Costa County marsh near the bank of the Sacramento–San Joaquin
Delta, officials said Tuesday. Staffers with the Delta Diablo
Sanitation District had been looking for a leak after noticing
reduced inflow into their treatment plant, but they weren’t
able to visually identify the spillage until around 3:30 p.m.
Monday. The leak, coming from a pipe that carries wastewater
from a storage center along its Mouse Trap-like journey to the
treatment plant, has deposited nearly 1 million gallons of
waste into the nearby marsh between Port Chicago and Pittsburg
every day since it started. “At a location such as this one
that’s subterranean, that’s in a marshland area, it was
difficult to identify on a visual basis,” said Vince De Lange,
the general manager of Delta Diablo Sanitation.
An investigation conducted by a regulatory agency that oversees
regional waterways refutes various claims about water pollution
at two Upvalley waste management sites. The “investigation
report,” released Monday by the California Regional Water
Quality Control Board’s San Francisco Bay Region, responds to
complaints lodged between October 2022 and November of this
year about operations at Clover Flat Landfill south of
Calistoga and the Upper Valley Disposal and Recycling Facility
on Whitehall Lane south of St. Helena. Based on inspections,
water testing, interviews and document reviews, the water board
concluded “that further investigation or pursuit of additional
enforcement against Clover Flat Landfill or the Upper Valley
Facility regarding the complaints is unwarranted.”
A congressional delegation from San Diego in October requested
EPA support to assist the San Diego County Air Pollution
District with air monitoring for neighborhoods near the Mexico
border. “In early September, high levels of noxious gases such
as hydrogen sulfide and hydrogen cyanide were measured by
scientific teams in the river valley and noticed by residents
due to the rotten egg smell even miles from the border,”
reports ABC 10 News San Diego. “Ultimately, crews from San
Diego County determined there was no immediate health risk, but
many residents believed the crisis had reached a turning
point.” … The Tijuana River sewage crisis has been an issue
for decades and continues to worsen because of increasing
population, a government sewage treatment facility that’s in
disrepair, and strained relations with Mexico over immigration
issues, according to the San Diego Coastkeeper.
Momentum is building for a unique
interstate deal that aims to transform wastewater from Southern
California homes and business into relief for the stressed
Colorado River. The collaborative effort to add resiliency to a
river suffering from overuse, drought and climate change is being
shaped across state lines by some of the West’s largest water
agencies.
Martha Guzman recalls those awful
days working on water and other issues as a deputy legislative
secretary for then-Gov. Jerry Brown. California was mired in a
recession and the state’s finances were deep in the red. Parks
were cut, schools were cut, programs were cut to try to balance a
troubled state budget in what she remembers as “that terrible
time.”
She now finds herself in a strikingly different position: As
administrator of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s
Region 9, she has a mandate to address water challenges across
California, Nevada, Arizona and Hawaii and $1 billion to help pay
for it. It is the kind of funding, she said, that is usually
spread out over a decade. Guzman called it the “absolutely
greatest opportunity.”
Innovative efforts to accelerate
restoration of headwater forests and to improve a river for the
benefit of both farmers and fish. Hard-earned lessons for water
agencies from a string of devastating California wildfires.
Efforts to drought-proof a chronically water-short region of
California. And a broad debate surrounding how best to address
persistent challenges facing the Colorado River.
These were among the issues Western Water explored in
2019, and are still worth taking a look at in case you missed
them.
The southern part of California’s Central Coast from San Luis Obispo County to Ventura County, home to about 1.5 million people, is blessed with a pleasing Mediterranean climate and a picturesque terrain. Yet while its unique geography abounds in beauty, the area perpetually struggles with drought.
Indeed, while the rest of California breathed a sigh of relief with the return of wet weather after the severe drought of 2012–2016, places such as Santa Barbara still grappled with dry conditions.
Blasted by sun and beaten by waves,
plastic bottles and bags shed fibers and tiny flecks of
microplastic debris that litter the San Francisco Bay where they
can choke the marine life that inadvertently consumes it.
Summer is a good time to take a
break, relax and enjoy some of the great beaches, waterways and
watersheds around California and the West. We hope you’re getting
a chance to do plenty of that this July.
But in the weekly sprint through work, it’s easy to miss
some interesting nuggets you might want to read. So while we’re
taking a publishing break to work on other water articles planned
for later this year, we want to help you catch up on
Western Water stories from the first half of this year
that you might have missed.
Each day, people living on the streets and camping along waterways across California face the same struggle – finding clean drinking water and a place to wash and go to the bathroom.
Some find friendly businesses willing to help, or public restrooms and drinking water fountains. Yet for many homeless people, accessing the water and sanitation that most people take for granted remains a daily struggle.
Californians have been doing an
exceptional job
reducing their indoor water use, helping the state survive
the most recent drought when water districts were required to
meet conservation targets. With more droughts inevitable,
Californians are likely to face even greater calls to save water
in the future.
For the bulk of her career, Jayne
Harkins has devoted her energy to issues associated with the
management of the Colorado River, both with the U.S. Bureau of
Reclamation and with the Colorado River Commission of Nevada.
Now her career is taking a different direction. Harkins, 58, was
appointed by President Trump last August to take the helm of the
United States section of the U.S.-Mexico agency that oversees
myriad water matters between the two countries as they seek to
sustainably manage the supply and water quality of the Colorado
River, including its once-thriving Delta in Mexico, and other
rivers the two countries share. She is the first woman to be
named the U.S. Commissioner of the International Boundary and
Water Commission for either the United States or Mexico in the
commission’s 129-year history.
Although Santa Monica may be the most aggressive Southern California water provider to wean itself from imported supplies, it is hardly the only one looking to remake its water portfolio.
In Los Angeles, a city of about 4 million people, efforts are underway to dramatically slash purchases of imported water while boosting the amount from recycling, stormwater capture, groundwater cleanup and conservation. Mayor Eric Garcetti in 2014 announced a plan to reduce the city’s purchase of imported water from Metropolitan Water District by one-half by 2025 and to provide one-half of the city’s supply from local sources by 2035. (The city considers its Eastern Sierra supplies as imported water.)
Imported water from the Sierra
Nevada and the Colorado River built Southern California. Yet as
drought, climate change and environmental concerns render those
supplies increasingly at risk, the Southland’s cities have ramped
up their efforts to rely more on local sources and less on
imported water.
Far and away the most ambitious goal has been set by the city of
Santa Monica, which in 2014 embarked on a course to be virtually
water independent through local sources by 2023. In the 1990s,
Santa Monica was completely dependent on imported water. Now, it
derives more than 70 percent of its water locally.
In rural areas with widely dispersed houses, reliance upon a
centralized
sewer system is not practical compared to individual
wastewater treatment methods. These on-site management facilities
– or septic systems – are more commonplace given their simpler
structure, efficiency and easy maintenance.
Microplastics – plastic debris
measuring less than 5 millimeters – are an
increasing water quality concern. They enter waterways and
oceans as industrial microbeads from various consumer
products or larger plastic litter that degrades into small bits.
Microbeads have been used in exfoliating agents, cosmetic washes
and large-scale cleaning processes. Microplastics are used
pharmaceutically for efficient drug delivery to affected sites in
patients’ bodies and by textile companies to create artificial
fibers.
Microplastics disperse easily and widely throughout surface waters and sediments. UV
light, microbes and erosion degrade the tiny fragments, making
them even smaller and more difficult for wastewater treatment
plants to remove.
The particles, usually made of polyethylene or polypropylene
plastic, take thousands of years to biodegrade
naturally. It takes prohibitively high temperatures to
break microplastics down fully. Consequently, most water treatment plants cannot remove
them.
The health effects of consumption are currently under
investigation.
Responses
Many advocacy groups have published lists of products containing
microbeads to curb their purchase and pollution.
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency regulates microbeads in
industrial, but not domestic, wastewater.
Federal
law required microbeads to be phased out of rinse-off
cosmetics beginning in July 2017. Dozens of states also
regulate microbeads in products. California has the strictest
limitation, prohibiting even the use of biodegradable microbeads.
Microplastics in California Water
In 2019, the San Francisco Estuary Institute published a
study estimating that 7 trillion pieces of microplastic
enter San Francisco
Bay annually from stormwater runoff, about 300
times the amount in all wastewater treatment effluent entering
the bay.
California lawmakers in 2018 passed a package of bills to raise
awareness of the risks of microplastics and microfibers in the
marine environment and drinking water. As
directed by the legislation, the State Water Resources Control
Board in 2020 adopted an official
definition of microplastics in drinking water and in 2022
developed the world’s standardized methods for testing drinking
water for microplastics.
The water board was expected by late 2023 to begin testing
for microplastics in untreated drinking water sources tapped by
30 of the state’s largest water utilities. After two years, the
testing was expected to extend to treated tap water served
to consumers. A progress report and recommendations for
policy changes or additional research are required by the end of
2025.
Directly detecting harmful pathogens in water can be expensive,
unreliable and incredibly complicated. Fortunately, certain
organisms are known to consistently coexist with these harmful
microbes which are substantially easier to detect and culture:
coliform bacteria. These generally non-toxic organisms are
frequently used as “indicator
species,” or organisms whose presence demonstrates a
particular feature of its surrounding environment.
The biochemical oxygen demand (BOD) of water determines the
impact of decaying matter on species in a specific ecosystem.
Sampling for BOD tests how much oxygen is needed by bacteria to
break down the organic matter.
Point sources release pollutants from discrete conveyances, such
as a discharge pipe, and are regulated by federal and state
agencies. The main point source dischargers are factories and
sewage treatment plants, which release treated
wastewater.
This 30-minute documentary-style DVD on the history and current
state of the San Joaquin River Restoration Program includes an
overview of the geography and history of the river, historical
and current water delivery and uses, the genesis and timeline of
the 1988 lawsuit, how the settlement was reached and what was
agreed to.
This 25-minute documentary-style DVD, developed in partnership
with the California Department of Water Resources, provides an
excellent overview of climate change and how it is already
affecting California. The DVD also explains what scientists
anticipate in the future related to sea level rise and
precipitation/runoff changes and explores the efforts that are
underway to plan and adapt to climate.
Many Californians don’t realize that when they turn on the
faucet, the water that flows out could come from a source close
to home or one hundreds of miles away. Most people take their
water for granted; not thinking about the elaborate systems and
testing that go into delivering clean, plentiful water to
households throughout the state. Where drinking water comes from,
how it’s treated, and what people can do to protect its quality
are highlighted in this 2007 PBS documentary narrated by actress
Wendie Malick.
A 30-minute version of the 2007 PBS documentary Drinking Water:
Quenching the Public Thirst. This DVD is ideal for showing at
community forums and speaking engagements to help the public
understand the complex issues surrounding the elaborate systems
and testing that go into delivering clean, plentiful water to
households throughout the state.
As the state’s population continues to grow and traditional water
supplies grow tighter, there is increased interest in reusing
treated wastewater for a variety of activities, including
irrigation of crops, parks and golf courses, groundwater recharge
and industrial uses.
The 28-page Layperson’s Guide to California
Wastewater is an in-depth, easy-to-understand publication
that provides background information on the history of wastewater
treatment and how wastewater is collected, conveyed, treated and
disposed of today. The guide also offers case studies of
different treatment plants and their treatment processes.
The 24-page Layperson’s Guide to the Delta explores the competing
uses and demands on California’s Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta.
Included in the guide are sections on the history of the Delta,
its role in the state’s water system, and its many complex issues
with sections on water quality, levees, salinity and agricultural
drainage, fish and wildlife, and water distribution.
Wastewater management in California centers on the collection,
conveyance,
treatment, reuse and disposal of wastewater. This process is
conducted largely by public agencies, though there are also
private systems in places where a publicly owned treatment plant
is not feasible.
In California, wastewater treatment takes place through 100,000
miles of sanitary sewer lines and at more than 900 wastewater
treatment plants that manage the roughly 4 billion gallons of
wastewater generated in the state each day.
