CENTENNIAL – A south metro utility has been tapped to find ways to clean up groundwater for drinking and, in turn, stretch out supplies in a thirsty state.
East Cherry Creek Valley Water & Sanitation District will conduct tests next year using an expensive reverse osmosis technology to filter its groundwater.
The system could expand the drinkable supply by 17 percent.
“This project is looking into the future and allowing us to stretch out our supplies by using technology,” said Kipp Scott, the utilities manager for East Cherry Creek Valley Water & Sanitation.
The Colorado Water Conservation Board, a state agency, will pony up most of the $400,000 cost. East Cherry Creek Valley will put up $55,000, and the South Metro Water Supply Authority will chip in $20,000.
The authority is a coalition of south metro water providers.
Reverse osmosis filtration already is used to clean up industrial pollution and to filter sea water in water-strapped coastal regions, but it has not been used for residential water supplies in the interior United States because of the expense.
“We’re advancing the science to see if we can come up with a cost-effective way of doing this,” said Kelly DiNatale of water engineering consultant CDM, which is overseeing the study. DiNatale also was the technical director for the Water Conservation Board’s Statewide Water Supply Initiative, a study of the state’s water needsand possible solutions. He’s also the former water water resources and treatment manager for the city of Westminster.
“We have a significant water quality challenge in the metro region and in Colorado,” he said. “All the clean water supplies have been developed, so we need to find new ways to use lower-quality water.”
The Water Supply Initiative estimated in 2005 that Colorado likely could add another 2.8 million people by 2030, raising the demand for water by another 202 million gallons of water a year.
The south metro region is being forced to look for new, costly water supplies. Most of the region relies on aquifers that are running dry.
A 2003 regional study by water providers found that shortages and higher costs would be commonplace for customers in as little as 20 years.
None of East Cherry Creek Valley’s 50,000 customers in Centennial and unincorporated Arapahoe County will be served with any of the water used in the tests, Scott said.
The tests will begin in April and stretch into the summer of 2008.
Joey Bunch: 303-954-1174 or jbunch@denverpost.com
This article has been corrected in this online archive. Originally, due to a reporter’s error, it stated that East Cherry Creek Valley Water and Sanitation would use a state grant to test a new treatment for groundwater. The grant will be used to treat groundwater.
