The Cambrian

Cambria water plant back online, preparing for tracer test

Cambria Community Services District is bringing the Sustainable Water Facility back online.
Cambria Community Services District is bringing the Sustainable Water Facility back online.

Services district personnel are ready to bring Cambria’s advanced water-treatment plant back online, according to an email sent Thursday, Aug. 25, by water department supervisor Justin Smith.

Smith was notifying Cambria Community Services District General Manager Jerry Gruber and engineer Bob Gresens, among others, about the status of the district’s Sustainable Water Facility (SWF, formerly called the Emergency Water Supply project).

The supervisor wrote that “we brought the SWF fully online today. We need to replace a few pH sensors but, all in all, it was a huge success. We will do some fine tuning tomorrow and then run the plant every Monday and Thursday in a closed loop until the tracer test is ready to begin.”

We need to replace a few pH sensors but, all in all, it was a huge success.

Justin Smith

CCSD water department supervisor

Smith said, “The cleaning and long-term storage of the R.O. (reverse osmosis) elements is 100 percent the way to continue in the future.”

The plant, on district property on San Simeon Creek Road, pulls from well and then filters and treats a brackish blend of fresh water, salt water and treated effluent from the wastewater treatment plant. Treated water from the plant is then injected back into the ground to flow slowly toward the district’s water-supply wells for the community.

The tracer test, required by the state, is to prove that it takes at least 60 days for the treated water to make that journey. The test is expected to start sometime in September.

This story was originally published August 25, 2016 at 2:08 PM with the headline "Cambria water plant back online, preparing for tracer test."

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