Outstanding Water/Wastewater/Recycled Water Project

The City of Fullerton provides 85% of business and resident water needs from their 11 groundwater wells. The Fullerton Main Plant, located in Anaheim, is home to five wells that are responsible for 40% of the City’s total groundwater production. The Fullerton Main Plant PFAS Treatment Plant is the first project in Orange County to use Granular Activated Carbon (GAC) to remove PFAS from drinking water and is phase one of a two-phase project to provide treatment to all five wells at their Main Plant facility. The Fullerton Main Plant PFAS Treatment Plant project was designed by Tetra Tech and constructed through a partnership between OCWD and the City of Fullerton. Tetra Tech provided construction management services and Leighton provided geotechnical inspection services during construction.  

The Fullerton Main Plant PFAS Treatment Plant removes PFAS to a level of non-detect at a flowrate of up to 5,000 GPM.  The Calgon Carbon supplied GAC adsorbs PFAS through five lead-lag Xylem supplied 1240 vessel systems (10 vessels total), each with a capacity to provide a 10-minute empty bed contact time at a flowrate of 1,000 GPM. In addition to the treatment vessels, the project includes a backwash recovery tank and pumps that will allow the City to recover the water used to backwash the GAC vessels and then send this recovered water through the PFAS treatment system so it is not wasted. Additional work at the site included reconfiguring all site piping and electrical conduits to accommodate future phase 2 construction, new drainage system improvements, new paved access around the site, and a masonry privacy wall and new landscaping along the entire site frontage. Phase 2 is currently in design and will treat all wells at the site, doubling the capacity of treatment once constructed.