West Coast Basin Desalination Program - Goldsworthy Desalter

Butier Engineering, Inc. provided construction management services for the West Coast Basin Desalination Program—Goldsworthy Desalter project. The scope of work included the installation of all associated well equipment, associated buildings, landscaping, general site improvements, transmission pipelines, and street improvements.

The desalination facility was constructed to remove the trapped seawater plume from the West Coast Basin and restore this affected portion as a local drinking water source. The Goldsworthy Desalter will clean approximately 250,000 AF (nearly 81.5 trillion gallons) of salty water.

The project elements included reverse osmosis (RO) feed water, and product water pump stations, an RO plant, and raw water, treated water, and brine pipelines.

Process equipment includes long tubular PVC vessels that are rack mounted and contain the RO membranes. Vessels are connected to a system of mechanical piping that feeds and discharges water from the RO process.

The 12-inch to 18-inch pipelines transport raw water to the desalter, treated water to the domestic water distribution system, and brine to L.A. County Sanitation District’s trunk sewer.

The desalination facility has its own supervisory control system (SCS) to monitor and control the operation of the RO and ancillary treatment systems including the on-site water production wells.