Chandler’s commitment to water conservation was recently rewarded when the City’s Ocotillo Water Reclamation Facility (OWRF) was chosen as the 2019 AZ Water Project of the Year for Wastewater Treatment Plants by the Arizona Water Association. Last year, the OWRF underwent a significant expansion and improved its treatment process and capacity, in what was, at the time, the largest wastewater construction project in Arizona.
The Ocotillo facility is a vital part of the City’s water and wastewater system and it helps Chandler realize the goal of ensuring that every drop of water in the City is used at least twice. When it opened in 1984, the OWRF was a conventional wastewater treatment plant with a capacity of 10 million gallons per day (mgd). As the City grew significantly through the years its wastewater treatment capacity had to increase as well. The OWRF expansion project started in October 2016 and was completed in May 2018. With its improved treatment processes, the expanded Ocotillo facility is now rated to provide 18 million gallons of A+ standard reclaimed water per day, and it has the ability to expand again in the future to 30 mgd.
The size and scope of the advanced treatment processes implemented at the OWRF made it the obvious choice as the AZ Water Association’s 2019 Water Project of the Year for Wastewater Treatment Plant. Read more about the project in the Arizona Water Association's Kachina Newsletter.
Photos courtesy of Arizona Water Association.
