The McKenzie River: Securing Springfield’s Water Future
For nearly three decades, Springfield Utility Board has been working to develop a new source of drinking water on the McKenzie River. Projections show peak demand for water to support homes and jobs here in our community will increase 48% over the next 50 years.
Today, most of Springfield’s drinking water comes from groundwater sources. SUB also has a water treatment facility on the Middle Fork Willamette River that produces 6 million gallons per day (mgd). Once available, the new McKenzie River source will be able to meet Springfield’s supply needs while adding needed system resiliency.
Proposed Facilities
The project includes these new facilities:
- Environmentally friendly water intake and pumps near the McKenzie River
- Filtration facility near Thurston Middle School, including trees and screening to help it integrate into the neighborhood
- Underground pipelines that carry water between sites
The new facilities are designed to be expandable for the future, eventually yielding 23 mgd of filtered drinking water.
Project Benefits
These are some of the project’s multiple benefits.
- Deliver high-quality water by using proven membrane filter technology that is well suited to treating McKenzie River water.
- Meet rigorous seismic building standards, increasing Springfield’s ability to recover after an earthquake.
- Secure the future of our water supply, preserving Springfield’s McKenzie River water rights.
- Increase fire protection by ensuring sufficient water flow and pressure citywide.
- Provide multiple sources of safe, clean water to supply our region’s two major hospitals.
- Support Springfield’s economic stability by providing a crucial resource necessary for local employers and jobs that rely on water.
Project Schedule and Funding
The project is currently in design and permitting. Construction is expected to begin in 2028, with the new facilities in operation in 2031.
The project will be financed through a combination of water rates from current and future customers, as well as long-term bonds (loans) to be repaid over time. SUB is also actively working to secure funding from state and federal sources.*
Frequently Asked Questions
Our region’s two largest water utilities share similar goals, including diversifying their water sources. That’s because multiple water sources are essential to protect Springfield and Eugene area homes and businesses from water service disruptions. EWEB plans to add the Willamette River as a new source for system resiliency. SUB proposes to add the McKenzie River to its current groundwater wells and surface water source, both to diversify its supply and to build capacity to meet an expected 48% increase in water demand over the next 50 years.
Yes – that was among the options considered. However, a shared facility would not fulfill the goal of diversifying water supply sources for both communities. To meet supply and resiliency needs, SUB is building its treatment facility on the McKenzie River. Since EWEB needs a source separate from the McKenzie River, it does not make sense to join SUB’s effort.
The existing facilities alone cannot fully meet future needs for Eugene or Springfield. Both were built before the risks of the Cascadia Subduction Zone Earthquake were fully known. While each utility has invested in upgrades, the existing facilities cannot be fully retrofitted to withstand a major earthquake. There are also broader system considerations, including future demand, operational flexibility, and the need for geographic redundancy, that make it impractical to rely on these facilities alone. The new treatment plants proposed by both utilities would be built to modern seismic standards, adding more capacity and two earthquake-ready facilities to the region, significantly increasing local resiliency.
EWEB and SUB have been developing separate water systems since the cities they serve were founded. Each customer-owned utility delivers billions of gallons of water annually to thousands of service connections. EWEB and SUB both have hundreds of miles of pipes and many millions of gallons of storage. The two robust water systems operate independently and have fundamental differences – different water supply sources and different operating pressures – that would make combining operations complex and costly. Keeping the systems independent also strengthens resiliency by providing flexibility during emergencies.
EWEB, SUB and Rainbow Water District have an agreement to maintain and improve existing interties that link their systems. Interties are piping connections that allow water to be shared on an emergency basis, but these connections are not big enough to meet normal customer demand. The three water utilities continue to work together on an intertie strategy and upgrades to address current limitations to sharing water.
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Published Coverage
About the McKenzie River
The McKenzie River is a 90-mile-long tributary of the Willamette River. It originates in the High Cascades at Three Sisters Wilderness and Clear Lake. A three-mile segment was buried 1,600 years ago by a lava flow from Belknap Crater.
The McKenzie drains a region of 1,300 square miles. Most is lightly populated – 70% of the land area is in public ownership. The McKenzie has served as the primary source of drinking water for the neighboring community of Eugene for more than 100 years.
The river is named for Donald McKenzie, a Scottish-Canadian fur trader who explored the river in 1812. It is recognized as one of North America’s highest quality drinking water sources, with nearly 13 miles designated and protected as a Wild and Scenic River.
*This project has been funded wholly or in part by the United States Environmental Protection Agency under assistance agreement 4D-02J97801-0 to the State of Oregon. The contents of this document do not necessarily reflect the views and policies of the Environmental Protection Agency, nor does the Environmental Protection Agency endorse trade names or recommend the use of commercial products mentioned in this document, as well as any images, video, text, or other content created by generative artificial intelligence tools, nor does any such content necessarily reflect the views and policies of the Environmental Protection Agency.