This paper will describe how Horizon City was able install a desalination plant outside of El Paso and dispose of the brackish water using evaporation ponds. The maintenance and operation costs of running the unit will be presented. The paper will also describe the challenges of keeping the RO unit running and its redundancies....

Arsenic contamination of groundwater is primarliy an outcome of natural geologic formations. The Town of Tornillo has had high arsenic concentration levels varying up to 0.15 mg/l, exceeding the maximum containment level for drinking water. In 2017, a new Arsenic Treatment Facility was constructed which oxidizes and removes existing iron concentrat...

The EPCWCID 4 (District) water quality has deteriorated in the past years. A grant from USDA was provided for the design and construction of the RO facilities. The RO facility will allow the District to expand their existing Fe and Mn pretreatment capabilities to also remove TDS. The new system sets the District at the cutting edge of technology f...

A brief history of the International Water Quality Laboratory. The capabilites the laboratory posseses and the analyses the laboratory provides to the Kay Bailey Hutchison Desalination Plant. The role the labortory played in the Direct Potable Resuse Plant pilot study and will play in the planned Aquifer Storage and Recovery Plant. Regulatory re...

The presentation will give an introduction to when the El Paso Water Brackish Water Desalination Plant was built and what lessons have been learned the past 10 years. It will talk about pilot testing, design flaws to the plant, changes that have been made to improve the operation and maintenance of the plant. The presentation will discuss the RO ...

The presentation will show all the complicated processes used at the Enviro Water Minerals plant. It will show the flow schematic that includes electrodialysis reversal, reverse osmosis, and other high technology processes. It will also present the challenges that have been encountered during the plant startup. Please see the attached PDF of the ...

Selective separation of mono- and multi-valent ions has important applications in water reuse, desalination, and salt production, by adjusting ion composition to meet product water quality requirements. In this study, we developed an innovative monovalent permselective cation-exchange membrane (CEM) CR671 by modifying normal grade membrane CR67 wit...

El Paso Water (EPWater) is developing the preliminary design for a new Advanced Water Purification Facility (AWPF) that would treat up to 10 million gallons per day (mgd) of secondary clarifier effluent to augment and diversify the city's current drinking water supplies. The proposed treatment train includes membrane filtration (i.e., microfiltrati...

The use of alternative, lower quality sources, such as brackish groundwater, saline surface water, and recycled wastewater (i.e., for potable reuse) are rapidly becoming an integral component of long-term portfolio planning, and all nearly all of these alternative supplies require desalination. However, in many areas, particularly inland locations...

One of the largest uses of water in the United States and the world is for cooling systems in power generation. Closed-cycle cooling towers produce a concentrated water stream (called blowdown) that is similar to the concentrate from a reverse osmosis system. This project was directed toward cost-effectively recovering 70% to 90 persent of the wate...

This project will provide 2,000 gallons per day of clean drinking water for the residents of Po Plume, Haiti, a community of about 500 people with no electricity whose only water source is brackish. The water treatment consists of a solar-powered Reverse-Osmosis (RO) system. A telemetry system will enable us to monitor the solar system and monitor...

In an arid and desert environment, water mangement is a challenge for all local public water systems, including El Paso Water. Any potable water treatment process that involves reverse osmosis is going to have a concentrate management component. This project presents an innovative way to increase the total system percent recovery by taking concen...

In July 2015, the TCEQ changed the process for public water systems to receive approval to build and operate reverse osmosis (RO) and nanofiltration (NF) facilities. The July 2015 rule changes allowed public water systems to base their proposed design on the manufacturer's models in lieu of conducting a pilot study. This presentation summarazes t...

Throughout the state of Chihuahua, we find Arsenic concentrations of 0.5 mg/l and Fluor up to 7.0 mg/l. The governmental response for small rural communities is using Reverse Osmosis Plants, which include other treatment technologies, providing low cost drinking water options. Alternatives should be explored for an increasing water quality problem....

The field of commercially available membrane products is vast and expanding. In the early 2000's the majority of the market share was held by 3 to 4 suppliers each offering a single product. Driven by demand to meet more challenging applications, these suppliers expanded their offerings to new membrane polymers and hydraulic configurations. Today,...