South Santa Rosa reuse projects to add millions of gallons of reclaimed water and remove effluent from the sound

Local utilities and engineering consultants described construction progress and environmental aims for the South Santa Rosa regional reuse system at the Restore Council meeting on Dec. 3.

Jeff Crigler, head of Holly Navarre Water System and executive director of FairPoint Regional Utilities, said the regional project will expand reuse capacity and remove effluent discharges from Santa Rosa Sound. "The project overall gives us about 4,500,000 gallons total additional reuse capacity," Crigler said, summarizing Phases 1–3. He put Phase 1 county costs at about $21,000,000, Phase 2 at about $17,000,000 and Phase 3 at about $4,000,000, and noted a $2,600,000 grant from the Northwest Florida Water Management District toward Phase 1.

Robert Jernigan of Jacobs Engineering, the design and construction-management firm for county portions of the project, outlined Phase 2 design and schedule: final QC was completed before Thanksgiving, documents were expected to go to bid in late January, with a two-month bid period and contractor mobilization in summer 2025. Construction is expected to take about 16 months. Jernigan said Phase 2 includes a long horizontal directional drill under Santa Rosa Sound—about 7,000 feet—that will be drilled from both directions and intercept in the middle; the low point of the pipe will be roughly 80 feet below the water surface. He emphasized the technical risk and the need to prequalify contractors for the bore.

Jernigan also provided environmental estimates tied to the Navarre Beach effluent relocation: the relocation and reuse effort is expected to remove on the order of 14,000 pounds per year of nitrogen and suspended solids currently permitted to discharge to the sound. "That'll be removed from the sound and it'll be discharged up at the rib site or, you know, reused in Gulf Breeze," Jernigan said.

Crigler noted the Tiger Point expansion will add about 1.5 million gallons per day of treatment capacity and could serve nearly 6,700 homes, improving resilience at a facility that is near the sound. When asked about construction coordination, presenters acknowledged potential disruption in corridors where road work is also occurring and said they would attempt to limit combined impacts.

What’s next: Phase 2 design documents will be issued for bid late January; county staff and Jacobs expect construction to begin in 2025 and to run about 16 months. Funding sources for Phase 2 include Restore funds and a water‑management-district grant. Presenters asked the council and partners to continue permitting and coordination work and to maintain training and procurement readiness for technically complex work.