Lake Hefner at record low water levels, when will city buy Canton water?

[Urbanized]

Hang on...we might end up drinking doo doo water?

[adaniel]

It's a great source of protein!

[bchris02]

That's not a sure thing yet, just something being talked about.

I hope it doesn't happen. The thought of drinking water with FECES in it disgust me. I'll be buying bottled water.

[HangryHippo]

I hope it doesn't happen. The thought of drinking water with FECES in it disgust me. I'll be buying bottled water.

This is beyond ignorant, and you're also naive if you truly think bottled water is any better than what you'd be drinking from Lake Hefner.

[Bellaboo]

I hope it doesn't happen. The thought of drinking water with FECES in it disgust me. I'll be buying bottled water.

Have you ever drank water in Colorado ? They use recycled wastewater.

Denver Water Recycling Plant treats wastewater for reuse - Progressive Engineer Magazine

[Pete]

From https://twitter.com/davidfholt; 5 months ago compared to today:

[jn1780]

I hope it doesn't happen. The thought of drinking water with FECES in it disgust me. I'll be buying bottled water.

You do know animals Pee and Poo in the lakes all the time right? They don't know Hefner and Draper are "Drinking water lakes." They take the dirty stuff out of the water when they treat it.

[Bullbear]

You do know animals Pee and Poo in the lakes all the time right? They don't know Hefner and Draper are "Drinking water lakes." They take the dirty stuff out of the water when they treat it.

Fish do it... animals do it.. People have pooped and peed in it. All sorts of things..lol..

[Urban Pioneer]

problem is its a hell of a lot more expensive to pump water up hill than it is to let it flow naturally to you

One would think even a modest raise in water prices would enable us to install broader pumping infrastructure to the SE. A statewide pumping system between lakes would be pretty cool and probably a prudent Public Works investment.

Makes me want to watch Chinatown.

[bradh]

I hope it doesn't happen. The thought of drinking water with FECES in it disgust me. I'll be buying bottled water.

Educate yourself please. Where do you think wastewater treatment plant effluent goes now? It goes into creeks and streams that somewhere down the line end up back in treatment process for another municipalities drinking water system.

I'm on the fence about using effluent from WWTP to replenish the source water though, because other ecosystems and communities down stream rely on that effluent for their own needs as well.

"Toilet to tap" is used in California quite a bit. Again, this is not taking sewer effluent and treating it right away for drinking water, this is returning the effluent to the source we pull our water for treatment from.

[LakeEffect]

Educate yourself please. Where do you think wastewater treatment plant effluent goes now? It goes into creeks and streams that somewhere down the line end up back in treatment process for another municipalities drinking water system.

I'm on the fence about using effluent from WWTP to replenish the source water though, because other ecosystems and communities down stream rely on that effluent for their own needs as well.

"Toilet to tap" is used in California quite a bit. Again, this is not taking sewer effluent and treating it right away for drinking water, this is returning the effluent to the source we pull our water for treatment from.

And even then, most Toilet to Tap systems use indirect methods, whereby the water is replenished through an intermediate source upstream of the normal supply. Wichita Falls, Texas has one of the few direct potable reuse systems. Wichita Falls, TX - Official Website - Public Works

I think the technology is great, but I too want to ensure that we aren't harming downstream needs when taking effluent quantity into account.

Something I always hear in the civil engineering industry - treated wastewater effluent is often cleaner than the water taken out of lakes and streams for drinking water treatment.

Final word - the EPA, and its delegated authorities, maintain strict standards for drinking (tap) water; the Food & Drug Administration, however, maintains the standards for bottled water. The standards are different and drinking (tap) water is held to a higher standard of safety.

[bradh]

Bottle water is the biggest scam alive. Just google up some videos on how water is treated or what goes in to a large water treatment plant to get lake water to your tap. You'll have a greater appreciation for it and learn something in the process.

[stratosphere]

Bottled water might be a scam, but i drink the hell out of it too. It looks and smells a lot better than what comes out of area Lakes

[gopokes88]

Bottle water is the biggest scam alive. Just google up some videos on how water is treated or what goes in to a large water treatment plant to get lake water to your tap. You'll have a greater appreciation for it and learn something in the process.

As a huge fan of capitalism, my goal is too one day take something that people get for free, package it, and make a ton of money. It may be a scam but dang whoever popularized it, that guy is a genius.

I might try to sell used ice one day.

[bchris02]

Guys I was joking. I know that treated wastewater is common as tapwater.

[Snowman]

Hang on...we might end up drinking doo doo water?

There waste water would be treated there before it is released (which is generally cleaner than the river it will be released into), then another treatment process happens here. Side note there are plenty of other communities upstream on the North Canadian and from Lake Altus already, their waste water went somewhere, likely into it in into one of those two eventually.

[soonerguru]

Altus-Lugert is filling fast. Almost at 80%, with inflows of up to 10000 CFS!

[OKCRT]

Altus-Lugert is filling fast. Almost at 80%, with inflows of up to 10000 CFS!

Lets pump it to OKC! It appears that every lake in Ok doing pretty good except Canton and Foss even though they are way up from lows.

[Midtowner]

Lets pump it to OKC! It appears that every lake in Ok doing pretty good except Canton and Foss even though they are way up from lows.

Why do you keep coming here? If Hefner gets low, Canton is the first, cheapest place for OKC to reinforce its water supply.. and that's what's going to happen. Gritch and bitch all you want, the recreational use of the water at Canton Lake is its secondary purpose. OKC and Tulsa are the state's most important economic drivers and the state and cities have a policy of allocating the state's environmental resources where they can do the most good. In this case, we occasionally turn Canton into a mudhole in order to make life more comfortable for the 1.5 million residents of the OKC MSA.

[mkjeeves]

That's not a sure thing yet, just something being talked about.

The plan was approved and rate hike implemented to pay for the infrastructure. It will be a few years down the road.

The Water Utilities Trust on Tuesday agreed to a five-year, $1 billion plan that includes work on a second pipeline to ship drinking water from southeast Oklahoma, steps to integrate separate parts of the water distribution system, and improvements to enable reuse of water from Oklahoma City’s Deer Creek wastewater treatment plant.

Treated wastewater would be of a consistently higher quality than the variable river water feeding Lake Hefner, said Marsha Slaughter, the utilities director.

North Canadian River water is of higher quality when rain falls and of lesser quality in dry weather, she said. “Everybody wants the water to be rain,” she said.

The city projects reuse of water from the Deer Creek plant would not begin before 2018.

Water circulated through the system would be treated at Lake Hefner, flow to customers, and then be flushed to the Deer Creek treatment plant.

There, the wastewater would be treated and returned to Lake Hefner via transmission pipes and the canal between Lake Overholser and Hefner.

Reuse figures into plan for Oklahoma City water | News OK

[gopokes88]

Techincally all water is toilet to tap at some point. You know given the fact there is the same amount of water is on the earth today as there was a billion years ago. (Minus the small amount shipped out to space)

[soonerguru]

UPDATE: Altus-Lugert is now almost 90% full, less than 3 feet below normal, and still filling at approximately 7,500 CFS as of this morning. It will be full by tomorrow, with additional water going into the flood control pool. Get your boats ready. The Western Oklahoma lakes may be the only ones open to boating for a while.

I will be surprised if any of the eastern Oklahoma lakes are open to boating before Independence Day, and unless we have a very dry June, it may be a stretch that they're open by then.

[Urban Pioneer]

That is really great news! I would like to drive out there at some point and enjoy the scenery. It has been years.

[soonerguru]

Sunday would be a good day. It's supposed to be sunny

[jn1780]

UPDATE: Altus-Lugert is now almost 90% full, less than 3 feet below normal, and still filling at approximately 7,500 CFS as of this morning. It will be full by tomorrow, with additional water going into the flood control pool. Get your boats ready. The Western Oklahoma lakes may be the only ones open to boating for a while.

I will be surprised if any of the eastern Oklahoma lakes are open to boating before Independence Day, and unless we have a very dry June, it may be a stretch that they're open by then.

The "Death Ridge" should start building in next week which will put us in our summer time pattern. There are going to be more isolated popcorn storms in the late afternoon due to all this moisture in the ground. We are probably going to see a tropical system from the Gulf of Mexico this summer since we now don't need more rain. lol

BEGINNING SUNDAY OR MONDAY...UPPER-LEVEL RIDGING STARTS TO TAKE
HOLD...WHICH SHOULD PROVIDE SUMMER-LIKE WEATHER ACROSS OKLAHOMA
AND NORTH TEXAS. ASSUMING THIS HAPPENS...IT WILL FINALLY SHUT
DOWN THE ALMOST DAILY BARRAGES OF STORMS AND FLOODING
RAIN...LEAVING ONLY ISOLATED SHOWERS AND STORMS IN THE AFTERNOONS.
WITH THE VERY WET GROUND...THESE AFTERNOON SHOWERS/STORMS WILL BE
MORE COMMON THAN IN A NORMAL SUMMER PATTERN. SIMILARLY...AFTERNOON
TEMPERATURES WILL REMAIN SOMEWHAT COOLER THAN WHAT WOULD OTHERWISE
BE EXPECTED...AS THE HEAT IS USED TO EVAPORATE WATER RATHER THAN
HEAT THE GROUND AND ADJACENT AIR.