City of St. Cloud Celebrates Drinking Water Week

(KNSI) — St. Cloud is observing Drinking Water Week 2023 this week.

The city encourages residents to learn where their drinking water comes from, how it’s treated for consumption and how access to clean drinking water is maintained.

The American Water Works Association calls it a “unique opportunity” for people to recognize those working to deliver drinking water and its role in our daily lives. The City of St. Cloud website says an intricate maze of underground pipes lies beneath our homes and streets connecting to treatment plants and equipment like more pipes, pumps, storage basins, treatment supplies and the engineers who design them. They also work to fix and maintain that equipment and repair water main breaks. There is also an army of lab workers testing the safety and quality of water.

The St. Cloud Water Treatment Facility is located in Hester Park. Nineteen wells were sunk in that area in 1907 to service the city water works with a pump house and filtration plant, but it wasn’t enough to supply the growing city, so a new plant was built in the 1950s. It has undergone two expansions and can now handle 24 million gallons of water per day. Another expansion project is underway there that should be completed this year.

Learn more about that project by clicking here.

The water and treatment facility in St. Cloud has been recognized several times, including earning a Best Tasting Drinking Water award and a PISCES award from the Environmental Protection Agency for “performance and Innovation in creating environmental success” in projects funded through the Clean Water State Revolving Fund program.

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