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Riverbank hears progress report on $124 million recycled water project; funding still pending
Summary
City consultants updated the Riverbank City Council on design, permitting and funding progress for the Riverbank Regional Recycled Water Project, which has an estimated midpoint construction cost of about $124 million. Major grant and loan decisions from FEMA and the State Water Resources Control Board remain unresolved.
Neil Colwell, program manager for the Riverbank Regional Recycled Water Project, told the Riverbank City Council on the evening the city’s 30% design is complete and that Brown and Caldwell is advancing 60% design work expected by mid-2025.
The project would expand the city’s existing pond-based wastewater treatment to produce and distribute recycled water for agricultural and other beneficial uses, and add treatment processes intended to reduce nutrients such as nitrogen. Colwell said the current midpoint construction estimate used for financing applications is about $124,000,000.
“The 30% design brought forward additional process elements, including a grit removal stage, reevaluated tertiary filters and revised biosolids handling,” Colwell said, describing how new elements aim to improve efficiency and longevity. He said the 60% design will add piping, structural and electrical details and recommended a preselection process for major equipment to improve procurement and design efficiency.
Why it matters: the project would create additional treatment capacity beyond the plant’s roughly 1.8 million gallons-per-day design capacity, address expected 20-year wastewater growth projections, and provide groundwater benefits by replacing some groundwater pumping with recycled water for agricultural users.
On funding, Colwell said the city applied to FEMA’s Building Resilient Infrastructure and Communities (BRIC) program in December 2022 for a $50 million grant; that application remains under environmental review through Cal OES. He said Riverbank has had more success with the State Water Resources Control Board, where the city was identified for an initial $50 million low-interest loan and a $3 million grant and subsequently became eligible for an additional $35.3 million in low-interest loan funding, bringing the potential State Water Board package to about $88.3 million.
Colwell described other financing options — EPA WIFIA loans, the California Infrastructure Bank, conventional loans or bond financing — but said consultants recommend maximizing low-interest loan programs and seeking grants where possible. He also said some near-term procurement steps are likely, including three equipment preselection RFPs that could bring council cost commitments on the order of roughly $200,000 for submittal design work.
Council members asked about the FEMA timeline and regionalization. Colwell said FEMA’s technical review has been passed and that the latest FEMA question (December 2024) focused on environmental clarifications; he said no final FEMA award had been received. He also told council that the State Water Board has not raised concerns about the project’s regional scope and that the current program is not being advanced as a multi-city regionalization.
Council and staff will return with discrete decisions later this year, including whether to move forward on equipment preselection and final design work. Colwell said the earliest optimistic construction schedule could begin in mid-2027 if all funding arrives quickly; a more conservative schedule moves bidding to 2029 with construction after that.
The presentation included requests to finish a Title 22 engineering report and permitting documents and to finalize recycled-water agreement templates for grower partners; Colwell said firm letters of commitment from growers are already on file and are supporting funding applications.
