Fort Lauderdale: New water plant remains on schedule; PFAS pilot set for September

Daniel Fisher, project manager, City of Fort Lauderdale, told the Infrastructure & Transportation Committee that construction at the new Prospect Road water treatment plant is more than halfway complete and that commercial operations remain on track for September 2026.

Fisher said the city completed designs for enabling works that were the city's responsibility and transferred them to the project company in February; he said those enabling works are expected to be finished in August 2025. “We are about more than halfway through with commercial operations scheduled either September 2026, and we're still on time,” Fisher said.

Project representatives and city staff described two near-term technical efforts the plant team is pursuing: a pilot to test removal of per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS), and an OCCT (optimal corrosion control treatment) study to reduce metal releases when the new treatment is blended into the distribution system.

The PFAS pilot will install a small-scale version of the plant’s nanofiltration and ion-exchange systems and run months of tests using water drawn from Well 32, the well field closest to the Prospect Road site. Staff said the pilot will begin in September and is intended to measure how much PFAS the current treatment train removes and whether the plant must be reconfigured (for example by changing the split between nanofiltration and ion exchange) to meet a potential federal limit.

City and project staff emphasized the pilot is a response to an evolving federal regulatory picture. Presenters said the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency finalized a proposed drinking-water PFAS rule (cited in the presentation as finalized Dec. 2, 2023) that sets a very low parts-per-trillion threshold and is being legally challenged by utilities and trade groups. Staff noted utilities must file implementation plans by 2027 if the rule stands, but testing capacity and lab turnaround times for the new low detection limits remain constrained.

Presenters described the plant’s current design as a mix of treatment technologies. According to the update, roughly 70 percent of plant flow is slated to run through nanofiltration and about 30 percent through ion exchange; city staff and the operator (IDE) want the pilot to assess whether different ion-exchange resins or a shifted split (for example 80/20) could reduce PFAS to the level required if the EPA standard is finalized and upheld.

Staff also reviewed program schedule and cost items. Slides shown to the committee listed a current contract value of about $411,000,000 (presented as the contract value with change orders to date) and said the total awarded project value at the February 2023 award was $666,000,000. City staff said the city is financing roughly 75 percent of the project and that contingency and other budgeted funds are available to cover change orders and enabling works already transferred to the project company.

Other operational items discussed included an upcoming transition period in which water from the new plant will be blended into Fort Lauderdale’s distribution system, the need to hire and train about 18 additional operations staff, and work at the 5 Ash pumping/storage facility to integrate the new plant with existing storage and distribution.

Committee members asked about customer-facing impacts. Fisher and others said residents may notice a transition period while treated water flows through older cast-iron distribution mains; staff said communications planning is underway to explain phased changes in taste or color during the switch-over.

No formal decision or new contract award was made at the meeting. Staff said they will proceed with the PFAS pilot and the OCCT study and return to brief the committee again in approximately six months.