Arizona Water Competition - New Gilbert Water Treatment Plant

Project Goal: Without altering its main functionality, restructure the Gilbert North Water Treatment Plant to improve operation so it accommodates the plant’s emerging issues from population growth.

The city of Gilbert’s water treatment plant recently experienced an increase in total organic content, which results in disinfection byproducts in the clean-water reservoirs. This project assesses four water treatment techniques to determine which consistently reduces high contaminant levels to Environmental Protection Agency standards.

The assessment looked at enhanced coagulation, a combination of ozone/UV and biological activated carbon filters, microsand filtration and nano filtration. These treatment techniques can reduce and sustain the water's total organic content, or TOC, levels to less than 2 mg/L.

A decision matrix considered economics, as well as social and environmental factors, to determine the most cost-effective and reliable method.