Current Recycled Water Users

Facilities at the RARE Water Project
The RARE Water Project at Chevron's Richmond refinery can produce 3.5 million gallons of recycled water a day

EBMUD currently provides recycled water to numerous sites for irrigation, commercial and industrial uses.

Industrial

The North Richmond Water Reclamation Plant is EBMUD's first major project to produce recycled water for an industrial application. With a design capacity of 5.4 million gallons a day (mgd), it is one of the larger industrial cooling water reuse projects in the nation. In operation since 1996, the EBMUD facility receives secondary effluent from nearby West County Wastewater District, provides tertiary treatment, and sends the recycled water to three cooling towers located at Chevron's Richmond refinery. Chevron used about 4 mgd of recycled water in Chevron's cooling towers in Fiscal Year 2012 (FY12).

EBMUD expanded its industrial recycled water program by constructing the Richmond Advanced Recycled Expansion (RARE) Water Project at the Chevron Richmond Refinery. The RARE Water Project can produce 3.5 mgd of recycled water and became operational in July 2010. RARE provides advanced treatment for secondary effluent piped from the West County Wastewater District. Facilities include microfiltration and reverse osmosis systems, storage tanks (up to 2-million gallons), and a variety of pumps, pipes and ancillary equipment. Chevron uses the recycled water in its boilers to generate steam to operate facilities and equipment used to manufacture gasoline, jet fuel, diesel and lubricants. Only extremely high-purity water can be used in the manufacturing process.

The Chevron Richmond Refinery uses a total of about 11 million gallons of water each day. With water from RARE and cooling tower use of recycled water, Chevron can meet about 7.5 million gallons per day of its total water needs with recycled water instead of using EBMUD's limited potable water. That means 7.5 mgd of drinking water can be made available for all EBMUD customers for other purposes -- an amount that meets the daily water needs of more than half the residents of the City of Richmond.

The documents below are PDF files which can be viewed and printed with Adobe Acrobat Reader, a free software.

application/pdf iconRARE Treatment Process Schematic
53.9 KB
application/pdf iconRARE Treatment Plant Site Plan & Process Steps
54.42 KB
Mandela Parkway landscaping and greenway
Oakland has been irrigating Mandela Parkway with recycled water since 2008

EBMUD Use

Since the 1970s, EBMUD has maximized water recycling at its own Wastewater Treatment Plant (WWTP) for various uses, including cooling water, equipment wash down, mixing chemicals, and landscape irrigation. About 2.4 mgd were recycled at our WWTP in FY12. Approximately 1.7 mgd of non-potable water is reused at EBMUD drinking water filter plants. EBMUD's Administration Building was retrofitted in 2008 to use recycled water for toilet flushing on the 2nd floor, to irrigate street-level planter boxes (pending a proposed improvement project), and to fill the sidewalk cleaning machines.

Irrigation

Richmond Country Club

EBMUD first supplied recycled water from the West County Wastewater District for irrigation at the Richmond Country Club in 1984. The Richmond Country Club is supplied with recycled water only when available due to other demands on the secondary effluent from the West County Wastewater District.

Children playing soccer on field irrigated with recycled water
Village Green Park in San Ramon began using recycled water in 2006

San Leandro Recycled Water Facility

In 1988, EBMUD constructed the San Leandro Recycled Water Facility to serve recycled water from the City of San Leandro's Water Pollution Control Plant. EBMUD customers currently connected to this recycled water system include two golf courses and the Harbor Bay Parkway in Alameda. Their recycled water use saved more than 57,000,000 gallons of drinking water in FY12.

East Bayshore Recycled Water Project (EBRWP)

In FY12, the East Bayshore Project supplied a total of more than 25,000,000 gallons to 16 customer sites.

When completed, the East Bayshore Project will supply an annual average of 2.2 million gallons per day (mgd) of recycled water to portions of Alameda, Albany, Berkeley, Emeryville and Oakland.

application/pdf iconEBRWP Fact Sheet and Map
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application/pdf iconEBRWP Treatment Process Schematic
2.1 MB

San Ramon Valley Recycled Water Program (SRVRWP)

The San Ramon Valley project supplied more than 212,000,000 gallons of recycled water to 41 EBMUD customer sites in FY12.

When completed, the San Ramon Valley Recycled Water Program will serve about 2.4 mgd of recycled water to EBMUD irrigation customers in portions of Blackhawk, Danville and San Ramon.

application/pdf iconSRVRWP Fact Sheet and Map
213.56 KB

Water Recycling Projects in Operation

 

Project and Location Type FY 2012 Savings (mgd) Began Recycled  Water Use
EBMUD Wastewater Treatment Plant Industrial/Irrigation 2.4 1971
Richmond Country Club Irrigation 0 1984
Metropolitan Golf Links/Oakland Irrigation 0 1988
Chuck Corica Golf Complex/Alameda Irrigation 0.14 1991
Harbor Bay Parkway/Alameda Irrigation 0.02 1991
Chevron Refinery/Richmond Industrial/Cooling Towers 4.0 1996
Chevron Refinery/Richmond Industrial/Boiler Makeup Water 2.9 2010
San Ramon Valley/
Phase 1		 Irrigation 0.58 2006
East Bayshore RWP/
Phase 1A		 Irrigation, industrial,
office building toilet flushing, possible wetlands restoration		 0.07 2008

 

 

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