Every Day — Innovative Water Treatment Process to Reuse 60 Million Gallons of Wastewater

After months of extensive study, Florida Power & Light Company and Miami-Dade County have developed an innovative water treatment process to reuse 60 million gallons of treated wastewater every day. In other words, as part of this project, Miami-Dade’s daily wastewater will be reused instead of ending up in deep wells or the ocean.Reusing the water would be part of a plan between FPL and Miami-Dade County to reduce the amount of county wastewater going into the ocean. “This will also eliminate Turkey Point’s nuclear plant use of water from the aquifer by providing a drought-proof supply of highly-treated water to improve the water quality of the plant’s cooling canals,” said Bianca Cruz, FPL’s spokesperson.

The proposed treatment facility would be able to treat up to 60 million gallons of wastewater a day, enough to generate 45 million gallons a day of usable water. Up to 15 million gallons would be used daily to cool the natural gas unit and 30 million gallons for the canals.

The wastewater treatment consists of a five-step process that will ensure wastewater is safe prior to being reused, and this is the same five-step process used to treat drinking water. During the treatment process, 99 percent of key impurities will be removed including viruses, bacteria, nutrients, and other compounds.

The alliance between FPL and the county is the most economical way to help Miami-Dade comply with the state’s mandate to reuse 117 million gallons of wastewater a day. Six years are left to meet this mandate. This collaboration with FPL would save Miami-Dade taxpayers hundreds of millions of dollars compared to any other proposal for meeting the requirement.

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The entire number of gallons of water—117 million—needed to comply with the state’s mandate could potentially be treated each day as a result of this project, and the additional water could be routed to local wetlands for rehydration.

“In the long term, the treatment facility could treat more wastewater and reach the state’s mandated target. Therefore, it would mean an economic benefit for taxpayers, but, more importantly, it would help safeguard the environmental sustainability of our local ecosystems, as this water could potentially be used to rehydrate the Everglades, which needs plenty of water,” added Bianca Cruz.