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Home> Water & Environment > Water Supply > Current Projects > Desalination Project Desalination Project Desalination (or desalinization or desalting) removes salts from the ocean or other salty water to produce fresh water through distillation or filtration. EBMUD studied desalination as a water source in the early 1990s, but at the time it was not a feasible alternative because of high cost and environmental impacts associated with brine disposal. Brine is the waste product of desalination that contains the removed salts and impurities. Recent improvements in desalination technology and costs have led EBMUD to reconsider desalination alternatives.  Bay Area Regional Desalination Project The Bay Area's four largest water supply agencies, EBMUD, San Francisco Public Utilities Commission, Contra Costa Water District, and the Santa Clara Valley Water District are jointly exploring developing regional desalination facilities that could benefit over 5.4 million bay area residents and businesses. The proposed Bay Area Regional Desalination Project may consist of one or more desalination facilities, with an ultimate total capacity of up to 120 million gallons per day. The regional desalination project would: Provide additional sources of water during emergencies such as earthquakes; Provide a supplemental supply source during extended drought periods; Allow other major facilities such as treatment plants, transmission mains, and pump stations to be taken out of service for an extended period of time for maintenance or repairs; and Provide a full-time supplemental water supply to increase the diversity of the agencies’ water supply portfolio, which would increase reliability. In May 2003, the partner agencies jointly completed the initial study, which concluded that there are at least three locations in the San Francisco Bay area where a regional desalination facility could be located. To view a map of the Bay Area Regional Desalination Sites click here. The three sites will undergo further study to better define what the desalination facilities might look like. In addition to the regional study, EBMUD is looking at a location near the C&H Sugar refinery in Crockett as a possible desalination site. back to top Available Publications   These documents are PDF files, which can be viewed & printed with Adobe Acrobat Reader, a free software.  Seawater Desalination in California (15kb)   Membrane Filtration Process (481kb)   Bay Area Regional Desalination Sites (566kb) Desalination Projects Fact Sheet (456kb)   For More Information For more information on this project, please contact Cherie Sakurai at csakurai@ebmud.com or (510) 287-1154.  back to top Site Map      Search     Contact Us     Publications      Disclaimer