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Chapter 10: A Long-term Commitment to Reliability
amounts of
water in either direction between
the reservoir, the Water Authority’s Second
Aqueduct and distribution facilities to the north
and south. A new and larger marina will be
constructed to replace the former marina, and
all phases of the dam raise project are expect-
ed to be completed by 2015.
PROTECTING THE AQUEDUCTS
As the region’s
water system grew,
so did the need for
aggressive efforts
to ensure these vital
facilities remain in
top working condi-
tion. The Water
Authority adopted
new approaches to
taking care of
what
would become a
$5 billion portfolio
of assets, including
300 miles of large-
diameter pipe.
In the early 1990s, for instance, the agency
developed a cutting-edge Aqueduct Protection
Program to rehabilitate dozens of
miles of
major underground pipeline that showed signs
of premature decay. This process usually
involves workers excavating and removing
40-foot-long sections of pipe at entry points, or
portals, roughly 1,500 feet apart. Using spe-
cialized equipment, they push steel liners inside
the existing pipes on either side of entry por-
tals. The technique is less intrusive to the sur-
rounding community than other approaches
and costs about 40 to 60 percent less than
pipeline replace-
ment. By mid-
2014, this multi-
decade effort is on
track to reline 39
miles of pipeline.
When the program
is complete, the
Water Authority will
have lined 82
miles of large-
diameter pre-
stressed concrete
cylinder pipelines
in the county.
In 2006, the Water
Authority became the first water agency in the
country to adopt acoustic fiber-optic technolo-
gy for monitoring its pre-stressed concrete
cylinder pipelines, and the first to adopt local
24-hour monitoring of
water pipelines. Seven
A worker documents where acoustic fiber-optic monitoring
cable exits the pipeline and enters a computer system that
constantly monitors the prestressed concrete cylinder pipe