Wichita’s Northwest Water Facility is a $500 million water treatment project designed and built by the team of Alberici and Burns & McDonnell, with major contributions from area engineers, architects and contractors. It is the largest capital investment the city has ever made.
The current 80-year-old water treatment plant serves over 500,000 Kansans in the Wichita area but is approaching the end of its useful life and will fall short of meeting the quality and quantity challenges of future growth. The facility lacks redundancy, endangering the region’s water supply when components fail.
The new facility has been constructed on 40 acres along 21st Street and Hoover Road and once fully commissioned, will supply 120 million gallons of water daily. Serving Wichita and numerous other communities and water districts, the facility will handle and blend water from wells, Cheney Reservoir and the city’s Aquifer Storage and Recovery Project.
Major construction activities have been completed, and the plant is now undergoing testing, commissioning and startup activities and is expected to be serving the Wichita community later this spring.