How It Works: BPU’s Water Service

A hand turns on a faucet and fills a glass of ice with water.

[Narrator] When you turn on a faucet, do you ever wonder where that water comes from? Let's find out.

A graphic appears depicting the Missouri River and the aquifer beneath it. To the left of the river is a building labeled "pump station." Below it is a large silver pipe labeled "caisson" that extends to a large blue area labeled "water." Extending from the Pump Station building is a much smaller pipe labeled "to water treatment plant."

[Narrator] In our community, BPU gets our water not from the Missouri River, but from underneath it. Our water comes from the Missouri River aquifer, where rain and melted snow from mountains as far away as Wyoming and Montana, collect and flow underground.

A time-lapse video clip of a snow mountain stream appears. The screen changes to three jars of water. The first is murky brown and is labeled "Missouri River Water." The next is tan and labeled only "River." The last is clear with no sediment and labeled "HCW."

[Narrator] This water is much cleaner than river water, because before it even reaches us, it filters through a natural layer of sand and gravel,

A glass frame filled with sand appears. Each layer of sand is labeled. From the bottom up the labels are: 2 inches of 1/4 inch sand, 2 inches of 1/8 inch sand, 4 inches of coarse sand.

[Narrator] which purifies the water. Water is then pumped to BPU's state of the art Nearman Water Treatment Plant,

Clips of the front of the Nearman Treatment Plant scroll across the screen, followed by the water going through various pipes and sprays.

[Narrator] and held in sediment basins, where it undergoes additional filtering. The water then goes through other stages of processing and filtering before chlorine is added to remove bacteria and fluoride is added to help fight tooth decay.

A woman in a lab swirls different colored liquids.

[Narrator] The water is tested over and over to make sure it's always safe and clean. Once it passes inspection,

A water tower with Kansas City, Kansas, and the BPU logo painted on it pans across the screen. Two men then walk over a bridge that is over a water treatment pond.

[Narrator] BPU pumps the water to the community using a system of pipes, pump stations, towers, and reservoirs, with a capacity to deliver more than 54 million gallons of water a day. All this hard work clearly pays off.

A set of hands adds drops of water to petri dishes then pans over other vials in the lab.

[Narrator] BPU's water system is considered one of the best and safest in the country, and has been awarded the best tasting water in Kansas. And BPU is the only utility in the area to receive a safe water award from the Environmental Protection Agency.

The camera shows a Directors Award for 100 years of service (1909-2009) at the Nearman Water Plant.

[Narrator] With all the care that goes into treating our water, it's important that we don't waste it. Let's all do our part to conserve this precious resource.

The hand from the beginning of the video shuts off the faucet and pulls the full glass away from view.