The California Energy Commission turned on the tap for an experimental seawater desalination plant in Moss Landing on Wednesday.
The commission, meeting in Sacramento, voted 4-0 to allow modification of the cooling water intake system for Moss Landing Power Plant by owner Dynegy so that some of that water can be diverted to a pilot desalination plant being installed by California American Water.
Cal Am plans to operate the desalination facility for a year to test the feasibility of converting Monterey Bay seawater to fresh water to solve the area's water shortage.
In Santa Cruz, city leaders and Soquel Creek Water District officials started construction last month on a $4 million pilot desalination plant at the UC Santa Cruz Long Marine Lab that will similarly test the viability of desalination.
The 6,500-square-foot Moss Landing plant will cost approximately $3 million and divert up to 288,000 gallons of seawater per day from the power plant's once-through cooling water intake system, which draws 180 million to 1 billion gallons a day.
The sea water will go through two parallel pretreatment processes and reverse osmosis systems, and the desalinated water [as well as the brine discharge produced by the pilot plant] will be mixed back into the power plant's outfall before being discharged into Monterey Bay.
None of the desalinated water produced will be used for human consumption.
Construction of the plant is already underway and "we expect that we'll be connecting the plant in September," said Cal Am spokeswoman Catherine Bowie.
Testing of the plant's equipment will follow, she said, and Cal Am expects it to be treating water by late September or early October. |
The pilot desalination plant is a precursor to development of a $200 million regional seawater desalination plant and distribution system by Cal Am at or near Moss Landing that would produce 11,730 acre-feet of fresh, potable water a year.
The water company's Coastal Water Project, including the regional desalination plant as well as aquifer and storage and recovery system, is its attempt to comply with a 1995 order by the state Water Resources Control Board to stop overpumping in the Carmel River.
