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Santa Clarita Valley Water Officials Moving Forward On Chloride Treatment

With last year’s approval of a $130 million plan to meet a state-mandated chloride limit in the Santa Clarita Valley, local wastewater officials are working on the best place to construct local facilities.


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Santa Clarita Valley Sanitation District officials have selected the proposed site for a test well, and if things go as planned, it should be online by 2015, according to Ray Tremblay, who, a  head of the Sanitation District’s monitoring section is de facto head of the project.

“On Oct. 28, our board approved a compliance project so staff is moving forward with the design of the facilities,” Tremblay said, adding that the firm is seeking professional drilling consultancy to assist with the project.

“We are a wastewater-treatment agency, but we do not have expertise in deep well injection,” Tremblay said. “We’re identifying a site for where we can put the deep well injection system.”

The proposed site, assuming that approvals and permits are granted from the county and federal government, would be a plot owned by Newhall Land & Farming near TPC Valencia, west of Interstate 5, Tremblay said.

Related articles: Chloride Plan Approved For Santa Clarita Valley Residents

“We are working with the landowner there to see if they’ll grant us land access for that purchase,” he added.

The plan, known as alternative two in the Sanitation District’s chloride-project report, involves additional water treatment processes aimed at achieving the state’s 100 milligrams per liter limit for downstream water.

Replacing the current systems at the Valencia water treatment plant, the plan calls for the brine or chloride in our water to be disposeA look at how Santa Clarita Valley water is treatedd through five wells dug miles into the earth’s surface.

In addition, chlorine based water treatment would be replaced by ultraviolet light disinfection facilities.

A pump station and an 8-inch diameter, 2.5-mile long pipeline would take the salt from the treatment plant to the proposed wells.

There is a chance that the well plan could fail, if the salt leaks back into the surface, but the Sanitation District has two other options in that scenario.

In the meantime, the Regional Water Quality Control Board, which fined the district into approving a construction plan, appears to be showing more patience now that the Sanitation District has a plan in place.

“In general, (Los Angeles Regional Water Quality Control Board Executive Director Sam Unger)  expressed a willingness to work with us,” Tremblay said.

“We’re still working with the water board to achieve additional cost savings as a result of relaxed requirements.”

Tremblay expects to be one of the Santa Clarita Valley Sanitation District officials in Sacramento on Friday for a hearing in front of the Commission on State Mandates.

Sanitation District officials contend that because the chloride limit is being mandated by the state, that chloride treatment-related construction qualifies as a state mandate, which means the state would have to pay for it.

Related articles: Chloride Hearing Could Impact Santa Clarita Valley Water Ratepayers


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Santa Clarita Valley Water Officials Moving Forward On Chloride Treatment

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About Perry Smith

Perry Smith is a print and broadcast journalist who has won several awards for his focused, hyperlocal community coverage in several different regions of the country. In addition to five years of experience covering the Santa Clarita Valley, Smith, a San Fernando Valley native, has worked in newspapers and news websites in Los Angeles, the Northwest, the Central Valley and the South, before coming to KHTS in 2012. To contact Smith, email him at Perry@hometownstation.com.