A water treatment plant being built near Fort Myers, Fla., will purify water from three different aquifers with three different treatment systems. The Lee County Utilities’ Green Meadows plant will boost the utility’s treatment capacity to 14 million gallons per day from 9 mgd to address population growth and enhance reliability. The $75.4-million plant will replace a 40-year-old facility and reduce treatment cost per thousand gallons by 60%. After nearly two years of construction, the project is ahead of schedule and under budget.
Two of the new plant’s sources already are serving the utility. “We had an existing allocation in our surficial aquifer and sandstone aquifer,” says Mikes Maillakakis, the utility’s project manager. The regional water authority allowed access to the brackish Floridan aquifer.