A municipality with a reputation for notoriously bad drinking water now has some of the best you will find anywhere.
The City of West Kelowna officially opened its $75 million Rose Valley Water Treatment Plant today.
"It feels great, Delivering safe, reliable, clean water has been a priority not only for our city council," said Mayor Gordon Milsom, "but also for our community."
The plant will be the water source for roughly half of the residents of West Kelowna.
The 23,000 sq. ft. facility can treat up to 70 million litres of water per day with room for expansion.
It's the largest infrastructure project in West Kelowna history.
"It's huge," said Milsom. "We now have clean water for 19 thousand plus of our residents."
The mayor admits it's taken a long time for this much-needed upgrade.
"I thank our residents for their patience for waiting for this special day."
Prior to the plant opening, residents relied on raw water from the Rose Valley Reservoir with nothing but chlorine treatment.
The result has been low-quality water at best with frequent boil water advisories.
"Those days are behind us," said Milsom.
The new plant provides a series of stages of treatment including coagulation, flocculation, filtration and ultraviolet disinfection before chlorination.
"We're going to have probably the best water in the province," he said.
If you divide the cost of the project by the number of people who will be using the water, the cost ends up at about $4,000 for each person who will be receiving the water.
The mayor is comfortable with it.
"It cost $75 million, but approximately $41 million of that money came from senior levels of government."
The plant is expected to meet the community's water demands for the next 25 years.
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