FOUNTAIN VALLEY- On Tuesday, March 2, and Wednesday, March 3, the AP Environmental Science (APES) class took a field trip to the Orange County Sanitation District (OCSD) to learn about the water-cleaning process. The OCSD exists to “protect public health and the environment by providing effective wastewater collection, treatment, and recycling,” the company states. The class went to visit to learn how water is cleaned before it is released into the ocean.

    The OCSD is a new facility in Orange Country, created to help the area deal with drought. Because Orange County does not have an abundance of natural water, they have to buy it from northern California or the Colorado River. 
    The OCSD operates the third largest wastewater agency west of the Mississippi River. For over 50 years, they have collected, treated and disposed of reclaimed wastewater generated by the 2.5 million people living and working in central and northwestern Orange County.

    Each day, OCSD treats approximately 230 million gallons of wastewater -  enough water to fill Anaheim stadium nearly three times each day. About 80 percent of the wastewater comes from homes, sinks, toilets, showers, laundry, and dishwashers. The rest comes from businesses, retail stores, restaurants, manufactures, hotels, offices, and other industries. 
   After the class visited the OCSD, they traveled to the OC Groundwater Replenishment Program to see how Orange County recycles dirty water. Ms. Regenfuss explained, “The course requires that the class go on a field trip to a utility, and it is part of a larger water unit. After the field trip, the students will be engineering a way to clean water in a class competition using what they have learned from the experience.”