The U.S. Bureau of Reclamation has awarded Oceanside $15 million to further programs that reduce the city’s reliance on imported water and increase the use of recycled and brackish groundwater sources.
Oceanside is one of San Diego County’s leaders in the use of purified wastewater, which is injected into the underground water table and later removed along with the brackish groundwater and filtered for use in the local drinking water supply.
Almost half of the federal grant money, or $7.1 million, will cover costs the city has already spent on the Pure Water Oceanside project, which was completed in 2022.
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency approved a $69 million low-interest loan in 2020 under the Water Infrastructure Finance and Innovation Act (WIFIA) that covered about half of the total cost of Oceanside’s water purification project. Most of the rest of the money came from grants and other loans based on revenue from the system.
The city will use $5.2 million of the Bureau of Reclamation grant to add another extraction well, brine minimization processes, and new reverse osmosis equipment at the Mission Basin Groundwater Purification Facility.
Reverse osmosis is the process of purifying water by sending it through a pressure-driven, semi-permeable membrane.
Oceanside began operations at the Mission Basin facility in 1992, filtering brackish groundwater taken from wells along the San Luis Rey River. The city expanded the facility in 2002.
The city will use $3.1 million of the Bureau of Reclamation grant to expand the recycled water system by building a 2.2 million gallon tank, a pump station and pipelines.