News: Committees of the 118th Congress, Hotel Block 80% Full, and More

January 23, 2023

Hotel Block is 80% Full – Book Today!

Space at the Marriott Marquis Atlanta, the 2023 WateReuse Symposium venue, is going fast! Discount hotel rates are available until February 10, 2023 or until block is sold out! A room at the Marriott provides easy access to all Symposium presentations, bus departures for facility tours, and networking events.

Book a Room

Let's Celebrate!

Early Career Professionals Reimagining Water Together

Monday, March 6 | 5:30pm
Join us Monday evening March 6 at 5:30pm for the early career professionals networking event. Get to know your peers over speed networking, the inaugural reuse facility puzzle contest, and light refreshments! Sponsored by Plummer.

Water is Life: An Evening at the Georgia Aquarium

Tuesday, March 7 | 6:00pm
Eat, drink, and dance in the Oceans Ballroom surrounded by views of the aquarium's beluga whales and Ocean Voyager, the largest aquatic habitat in the Western Hemisphere. Join small-group tours to view the aquarium’s pump room and water quality systems center; as well as the upper Ocean Voyager exhibit, upper Tropical River, and Vet Services. Sponsored by AECOM.

Let’s Toast to Water Reuse!

WateReuse Association is proud to announce Revival Lager, the official recycled water beer of the 2023 WateReuse Symposium! Atlanta-region Fox City Brewing partnered with WateReuse and our sponsor, H2O Innovation, to bring this fresh, thirst-quenching lager to life. Revival will be available at events during the Symposium.

Washington Updates

Committee Rosters Begin to Take Shape in the 118th Congress

As the 118th Congress kicks off, the House Committee on Natural Resources (HNR) and House Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure (T&I) named new and returning Republican members of each committee. HNR Chairman Bruce Westerman (R-AR) named seven new members from California, Florida, Georgia, Guam, Virginia, Texas, and Wyoming. The full list of new and returning Republican members can be found here. The roster has not yet been set on the Democratic side, nor have subcommittee members been named. Similarly, House T&I Committee Chairman Sam Graves (R-MO) welcomed 17 new members and 18 returning members to the Committee, who can be found here. As with HNR, Democratic members of the Committee have not yet been named, nor have subcommittee rosters been set. For both the HNR Committee and the T&I Committee, these representatives were recommended by the Republican Steering Committee and will need approval by the full Republican Conference to officially sit on the committees.

Alongside the authorizing committees, new House Appropriations Committee Chair Kay Granger (R-TX) named new appropriations subcommittee chairs as well as new Republican members of the full Committee. The new chair of the Interior-Environment Appropriations Subcommittee, which has jurisdiction over the U.S. EPA and its programs, is Representative Mike Simpson (R-ID), while the new chair of the Energy and Water Appropriations Subcommittee, which has jurisdiction over the Bureau of Reclamation and its programs, is Representative Chuck Fleischmann (R-TN). A list of the new Republican members of the full Committee can be found here. Democratic members have not yet been named, nor have the subcommittee rosters been finalized.

WOTUS Final Rule Posted to Federal Register

Last week, the final rule defining Waters of the United States (WOTUS) was posted to the Federal Register with an effective date of March 20, 2023. As previously reported, this definition failed to incorporate WateReuse comments regarding establishing exclusions for water recycling facilities and stormwater features explicitly. However, the rule does include a longstanding exclusion for waste treatment systems, including treatment ponds or lagoons, designed to meet the Clean Water Act. WateReuse will continue to work with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (U.S. EPA) to ensure that the WOTUS rule effectively protects the environment without adversely impacting water reuse and recycling facilities, such as percolation ponds and spreading grounds. The Fall 2022 Unified Regulatory Agenda indicates that the U.S. EPA will undertake the second rule on WOTUS in November 2023.

U.S. EPA Advances Infrastructure Funding through the State Revolving Fund

The U.S. EPA awarded more than $1.4 billion in supplemental grants to states through the Clean Water State Revolving Fund fiscal year 2022. The funding was provided by the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, also known as the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law (BIL). The grants were awarded grants to 38 states, including California ($127.2 million), Colorado ($14.2 million), Maryland ($43 million), Nevada ($8.7 million), New Mexico ($8.7 million), South Carolina ($18.2 million), Texas ($81.3 million), Virginia ($36.4 million), and Washington ($30.9 million). The states will in turn provide low-interest loans to sponsors of water recycling and other clean water projects. In addition to this funding, the CWSRF Program awarded $36.8 million to 21 states through the BIL Emerging Contaminants Grants Program. This is the first portion of a total of $1 billion over five years provided by the BIL. Water recycling projects are eligible for SRF Emerging Contaminants Grants if they address the program’s goals.

The U.S. EPA hosted a webinar last week discussing example projects and activities that the Emerging Contaminants Grants Program can cover, including water conservation and reuse. Other eligible project activities include monitoring emerging contaminants as part of project planning and design, assessing a project’s effectiveness at removing emerging contaminants, constructing projects to treat wastewater to remove emerging contaminants from discharge or biosolids, demonstration projects to evaluate specific technologies before full-scale implementation, and advanced treatment systems that can be added to remove emerging contaminants. The webinar highlighted WateReuse member Tucson Water’s PFAS removal efforts as an example project. Webinar recording and slides will be posted here.

U.S. EPA Water Reuse Program Engages Agricultural Community

The U.S. EPA’s Water Reuse Program Leader, Sharon Nappier, and Office of Water Principal Deputy Assistant Administration, Bruno Pigott, recently participated in the first convening of EPA’s Farm, Ranch, and Rural Communities Federal Advisory Committee. Nappier and Pigott spoke with Committee members about opportunities for water reuse and recycling within the agricultural context. The discussion covered the differences across states regulations related to agricultural reuse, and how the EPA’s REUSExplorer can be effective tool to support the agricultural community’s understanding of the varying fit for purpose specifications. See the meeting agenda here and learn more with our Profile in Agricultural Reuse.

U.S. EPA Announces Effluent Guidelines & PFAS Influent Study

Last Friday, the U.S. EPA released the pre-publication version of the Effluent Guidelines Program Plan 15. The agency expressed the intent to conduct a Publicly Owned Treatment Works (POTW) Influent Study of per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS). Pending available resources, the study will collect nationwide data on industrial discharges of PFAS to POTWs by partnering with wastewater treatment facilities to conduct national sampling. More details of the sampling strategy and an Information Collection Request will be released. Additionally, the plan laid out the EPA’s intention to develop effluent guidelines and pretreatment standards for landfills that discharge leachate based on the results of the Landfill Leachate Detailed Study. The schedule for the rulemaking is pending and will be published in the EPA’s Regulatory Agenda.

State Updates and Member Profiles

Welcome New Members!

Clearflow Group US Inc. joins the WateReuse Association and the Arizona section as a manufacturing, operations, and consulting company serving large mining, industrial, and municipal operations. Clearflow Group partners with universities and federal agencies and seeks to provide environmentally sustainable solutions to improve water quality while protecting watersheds today for a greener, more sustainable tomorrow.

CO: Federal Funding Will Help Double Reuse Capacity for Aurora Water

Assistant Secretary of the Interior Tanya Trujillo toured Aurora Water’s Prairie Water project on January 13, celebrating $5 million in federal Bipartisan Infrastructure Law funding to help double the facility’s capacity. The Prairie Water project provides indirect potable reuse for the community using the South Platte River as an additional environmental buffer. With federal officials demanding answers from the seven Colorado River Basin states by February 1 on how they will sharply cut water use to save Lake Powell and Lake Mead, the Aurora project demonstrates how urban areas are trying to do their conservation share, Trujillo said. Read more.

International Update

Mexico: Cross-Border Solution Includes Water Reuse

Recent Pacific coast storms have exacerbated the issue of transboundary flow which can cause partially treated wastewater to flow from the Tijuana River into coastal waters of Mexico and the U.S. The United States has allocated $300 million to address the issue, matched by $144 million from Mexico. One of the proposed projects will implement water reuse at a wastewater treatment plant in Tijuana. Reuse will reduce Tijuana’s dependence on the Colorado River, improve sanitation standards, and improve local water supply reliability. A former Tijuana resident lamented abrupt cutoffs: “you become really frugal with water and are almost counting the drops you’re using – it’s survival mode.” Read more.

Australia: Sydney Area Water Recycling Center Advances

Sydney Water is developing a water recycling center in Western Parkland City that will produce recycled water, renewable energy, and bio-resources. The Upper South Creek Advanced Water Recycling Centre (AWRC) is anticipated to recycle around 18 million gallons per day at full capacity. The AWRC will primarily use the water to maintain healthy environmental flows in surrounding waterways. Other potential uses include manufacturing, agriculture, and irrigation. Sydney Water’s Head of Western Sydney Development Renee Ingram says it’s the region’s “largest investment in water resilience in a decade and will provide a secure source of rainfall-independent water for Western Sydney.” Read more.

Abu Dhabi Prioritizes Water Recycling for District Cooling

Abu Dhabi recently announced a new policy to regulate which sources of water can be used by district cooling providers; prioritizing recycled water, desalinated water, and seawater. The policy allows a blend of water sources to be used in district cooling systems if they prove to be the most feasible and cost-effective source. By allowing district cooling companies to explore feasible water sources that best meet their needs, water losses in the form of evaporation, droplet drifts, and blowdown in cooling towers could be mitigated or captured. Read more.

Research Opportunity

Water Reuse Research Opportunity

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (U.S. EPA) Water Reuse Program has an open research opportunity for recent graduates. The research opportunity offers the opportunity to be exposed to regulatory, policy, technical, and research experiences related to technology, innovation, and policy in the water reuse space in the Office of Water, Office of Science and Technology in Washington, D.C. Learn more.

WateReuse Member Resources and Benefits

Profile in Onsite Reuse

The Profile in Onsite Reuse, part of our Profiles in Reuse series, is a simple two-page fact sheet that explains onsite water recycling in an approachable way that can be shared with members of the public, decision-makers, and other stakeholders. The Profile highlights the many benefits of onsite reuse including water supply, resilience, environmental protection, and cost savings. It also includes five brief case studies about onsite reuse projects in every region of the United States.

View the Profile in Onsite Reuse

WateReuse Event Calendar

WRAZ Webcast: PFAS Implications in WateReuse

January 26
9:30 am PT | 10:30 am MT | 12:30 pm ET
Free to WateReuse members

Due to potential negative health consequences of per- and poly-fluorinated alkyl substances (PFAS), this group of chemicals are being considered by U.S. EPA for regulation under the Safe Drinking Water Act. Since PFAS compounds are widely observed in municipal wastewaters and are often not completely removed through the traditional wastewater treatment processes, water reuse applications are inevitably faced with the presence of these contaminants in the recycled water stream. This presentation will explore the background and treatment of PFAS and discuss implications of treatment schemes being considered for direct potable reuse in Arizona and other communities.

Webcast: Australian Water Reuse Perspectives

US (East Coast) | Jan 30, 5pm-6:30pm ET
US (West Coast) | Jan 30, 2pm-3:30pm PT
Sydney, Australia| Jan 31, 9am-10:30am AEDT

How is the driest inhabited continent on earth – Australia – utilizing water recycling? Water recycling has a long history for irrigation, industrial use, and purple pipes for household outdoor use and toilet flushing. In Western Australia, Perth’s Groundwater Replenishment Scheme provides purified recycled water for drinking, and other cities are now exploring this option. This webcast will cover Australia’s experience with water recycling, the future and regulatory outlook, and the emerging use of recycled water for green hydrogen, as Australia moves towards a decarbonized future.

WRTX Webcast: Tel Aviv to Texas: Lessons Learned from the 2022 Israel Delegation

February 15
11:00 am PT | 1:00 pm PT | 2:00 pm ET
Free to WateReuse members

November 2022, over 40 representatives from the U.S. water sector, including utilities, industry, states, and the federal government, traveled to Israel as part of a science, technology, and policy informational exchange focused on water reuse practices. This intensive week of learning about the Israeli approach to managing its water resources included several delegates from Texas. The panelists will share their general experience as part of the delegation.

2023 WateReuse Symposium:
Reimagining Water Together

Marriott Marquis Atlanta
Atlanta, Georgia
March 5-8, 2023

Become a Sponsor or Exhibitor today! Read the prospectus and contact abray@watereuse.org.

The Annual WateReuse Symposium is the premier conference on water recycling — attracting water professionals and water reuse practitioners globally for knowledge-sharing, networking, and intriguing discussions! The event is planned in collaboration with The Water Research Foundation and will include engaging sessions on the latest reuse-related research projects.

WateReuse is pleased to bring the Symposium to Georgia and the Southeast, a region that is quickly emerging as a water recycling hotspot. Seven technical session tracks will highlight how utilities and businesses large and small can benefit from water recycling. Themes for the 2023 WateReuse Symposium include small and underrepresented communities, implications of PFAS in reuse, industrial and commercial reuse, telling the reuse story, and more!