Ventura Water plans $302 million treatment overhaul and purified recycled supply to bolster drought resilience
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Summary
General Manager Gina Dorington details Ventura Water’s plan to replace aging wastewater infrastructure with a membrane bioreactor and ultraviolet disinfection system, pursue purified recycled water for up to 20% of future supply, and manage rising operating costs tied to energy and chemicals.
Gina Dorington, Ventura Water general manager, said the utility is moving forward with a large treatment‑plant replacement and a purified recycled water program to reduce the city’s reliance on climate‑sensitive local supplies.
"We treat over 7 and a half million gallons a day of water," Dorington said, noting the wastewater reclamation facility is about 70 years old and several structural elements have shown near‑failure conditions. "The structural analysis came back at near failure," she said, adding the city is monitoring tanks and walls that have developed cracks and could be vulnerable in a magnitude‑4 earthquake.
The city’s solution is a membrane bioreactor (MBR) combined with ultraviolet light disinfection, a modernization Dorington said would reduce the plant footprint, provide more robust treatment and deliver a facility with a 50–60 year lifecycle. "That is the biggest infrastructure project the city's undertaking, and that is $302,000,000 currently at the estimate," she said.
Why it matters: Ventura relies on a local portfolio — the Ventura River, groundwater basins and Lake Casitas — that Dorington says are all susceptible to climate impacts and regulatory limits. Episodic heavy rainfall, she explained, does not replenish groundwater basins the way steady recharge or engineered solutions can, leaving the city vulnerable during multi‑year droughts.
To address that vulnerability, Ventura has pursued State Water allocations and is advancing locally controlled supplies through purification of treated wastewater. Dorington described the Ventura Water Pure project to treat and purify effluent and inject it into groundwater basins, estimating the program could supply up to 20% of Ventura’s future water and improve basin quality.
Operations and costs: Dorington emphasized that delivering water is continuous and labor intensive. Ventura Water staffs roughly 110 employees across sampling, treatment operations, engineering, biology and resource planning. The system serves approximately 14,000 acre‑feet of demand per year, operates nearly 400 miles of pipeline, 19 pump stations and three water treatment facilities, and maintains more than 300 miles of sewer lines.
She also described a recent emergency response when multiple alarms triggered around 3 a.m. on a Saturday: "All of our 11 sewer lift stations were in failure, and all of our 19 pump stations had no power," she said, noting crews checked generator fuel, communications and levels to maintain service.
Dorington warned of fast‑moving operating‑cost pressures: energy and chemical costs spiked significantly in the prior two years and, she said, some costs are about 123% higher than five years ago. To manage finances, Ventura Water conducts a 10‑year outlook and a 5‑year rate study cycle to set rates that cover operations and capital needs while avoiding depletion of reserves.
What’s next: The MBR project and Ventura Water Pure remain capital priorities. Dorington said the projects will require substantial investment and careful rate and financing planning; the utility is refining project delivery approaches and collecting bid results to improve cost estimates. The interview closed with a promise that future discussions will focus on funding strategies for the utility’s capital program.
