OJAI VALLEY : Consultant Proposes Selling Waste Water

Instead of building a costly new treatment plant, the Ojai Valley Sanitary District could just stop putting waste water into the Ventura River, consultant John Murk told the district’s board.

Murk said Monday night that the most economic way to dispose of the waste water is to sell it to farmers or industry.

The district was ordered by the Los Angeles Regional Water Quality Control Board to improve the quality of the waste water it discharges into the Ventura River as a condition for renewing the plant’s permit.

The district pours an average of 2 million gallons of treated waste water into the river each day and has the capacity to handle 3 million gallons.

But an engineering study indicates that the present plant, built in the early 1960s, cannot be upgraded and an entirely new facility would have to be constructed to meet the stringent new requirements at an estimated cost of $25 million.

To pay for a new plant, rates would increase from the present $16.14 a month to more than $35.

District General Manager Eric Oltmann is optimistic that the waste water could be sold for irrigation or oil recovery.

“The oil companies, if they’re our market, could use every drop of water we produce,” he said.

The quality of the waste water would still have to be upgraded, but the existing plant could be modified at significantly less cost than building a new facility, Oltmann said. The sale of the waste water could be used to offset the cost, and agencies such as the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California might be interested in subsidizing such an effort.

The board expressed interest in Murk’s proposal, but board member Ted Cartee warned: “It runs straight against the proposals of the board that sets the rules.”

The directors took no action on Murk’s report, but at their June 17 meeting they will consider alternatives to building a new plant.