EMWD commits to long-term groundwater supplies

Press release from Eastern Municipal Water District:

PERRIS -- Eastern Municipal Water District is looking to the future by looking underground.

As part of its commitment to provide long-term water supply reliability to its growing communities, EMWD is expanding investments in local groundwater supplies through its Groundwater Reliability Plus program that will shape the way it provides service moving forward.

EMWD was originally founded in 1950 to help area landowners manage groundwater rights in the San Jacinto Valley. Since then, EMWD has grown to become the state’s sixth-largest retail water agency and currently serves nearly 1 million people across 558 square miles.

To prepare for the anticipated growth in its region in the coming decades, EMWD is expanding its groundwater infrastructure and supplies throughout its service area through additional wells, treatment facilities and groundwater replenishment programs.

“Our Groundwater Reliability Plus program is the roadmap for our future,” EMWD Board President Phil Paule said. “By investing in our local groundwater supplies, EMWD is providing a reliable and cost-effective water supply source our customers can depend on.”

EMWD currently has three major groundwater programs in various stages of construction throughout its service area:

-- This year, EMWD will complete work on its third groundwater desalination facility in Menifee. The Perris II Desalter will significantly expand EMWD’s ability to remove naturally-occurring salts from groundwater in the Perris and Menifee areas and produce a high-quality drinking water source.

-- EMWD’s Perris North Groundwater Program is constructing six wells and a groundwater treatment facility in Moreno Valley. This program will clean up local groundwater contamination and provide the infrastructure to serve thousands of households each year.

-- EMWD is also constructing four groundwater wells and a treatment facility in San Jacinto as part of its regional Santa Ana River Conservation and Conjunctive Use Program. In late 2021, EMWD completed work on its Mountain Avenue West Groundwater Replenishment Facility in San Jacinto that will allow EMWD to replenish its local groundwater supplies with water from Northern California and other sources during wet and normal years.

EMWD is also in the design stage of a Purified Water Replenishment (PWR) program. This program, located in San Jacinto, will take EMWD’s recycled water and apply additional treatment levels including advanced microfiltration and reverse osmosis technologies.

The advanced treated recycled water will be placed into EMWD’s Mountain Avenue West Groundwater Replenishment Facility, where it will percolate into the local aquifer and provide a clean, safe and reliable water supply source. That water will be underground for approximately five years before it is extracted and cleaned once more before being used as drinking water.

“Groundwater is a valuable resource and EMWD is proud to not only expand our groundwater infrastructure, but to responsibly manage our local groundwater basins so they are sustainable for future generations,” Paule said.

For more information on EMWD’s Groundwater Reliability Plus program, please visit www.emwd.org/gwr-plus.