UtilitiesTop story
Tampa Bay Water gets a $10 million state grant to expand its drinking water plant
The plant expansion adds capacity for a growing region
- $10 million
- in state grant money for the expansion
- 12.5 million
- gallons per day of added treatment capacity
- Nearly 14%
- increase in treatment capacity
- $181 million
- approximate cost of the expansion
Sources: St Pete Catalyst, WUSF
If your water comes through Tampa Bay Water, this one's for you. The wholesale supplier for St. Petersburg, Tampa, New Port Richey and Pinellas, Hillsborough and Pasco counties won a $10 million Alternative Water Supply Grant to expand its Regional Surface Water Treatment Plant in Tampa. Gov. Ron DeSantis announced the awards Oct. 28.
The expansion adds a fifth treatment process train. Think of a train as an assembly line: raw water passes through a series of filters, then gets treated with chemicals to make it safe to drink.
“The project will also support the resiliency of our water infrastructure. We need more redundancy.”
Karim Molina-Oyola, Tampa Bay Water senior project manager
- Customers: more than 2.6 million people
- Statewide: $100 million for 45 water projects
- Earlier funding: $1,016,667 congressional, $1 million state
- Plant in operation since 2002
The expansion is expected to finish in 2028
- Oct. 28DeSantis announced $100 million for water projects, including Tampa Bay Water's $10 million.
- 2028The expansion is expected to be completed and online.
- 2033The expansion is expected to meet the region's drinking water demands through 2033.
Sources: St Pete Catalyst, WUSF
