Berea Water- Rich in History

The City of Berea owns and operates its own drinking water treatment plant right here in downtown Berea. Using water from the East Branch of the Rocky River, or alternately Coe Lake, an average production of 2.1 Million Gallons per day is treated and pumped to the residents of Berea.

In the event of an emergency in which the plant would be unable to supply water, Berea does have interconnects with the City of Cleveland.

Berea has a long history of decisions and investments into it’s water supply. The original forefathers of Berea started pumping water to the City due to destructive fires in the late 1800’s. in 1898 Berea decided to pump water and supply the city with a means of preventing such devastating fires again to this small quarry town of immigrants.

In the 1920’s Berea began to treat the water to prevent sickness and disease and began providing services to homes and businesses.

During the 1980’s Dr. Dimiter Ramadanoff, a local scientist and leader in our community, dedicated much of his time ensuring Berea sustained its own treatment plant and was progressive in implementing cutting edge technologies. In 1984, Berea was the first drinking water plant in the state of Ohio to have Ozonation as a means of disinfection. Although ozone is no longer used in Berea, it has been replaced with other advanced treatment technologies- namely Activated Carbon Filtration, and Ultraviolet Light disinfection. Berea remains one of the few facilities in the state who can boast both of these advanced treatment techniques.

Today

Berea is proud to be able to operate, manage, and control decisions about it’s water quality, level of service, and financial impact to it’s customers. We are here 24 hours a day right in your community and pride ourselves on being able to provide outstanding service response time to water main breaks, meter or service line issues, and questions or concerns about your water quality and supply.

Berea- Looking to the Future

The Flint Michigan crisis has changed America’s beliefs in its government and its assurance that your drinking water is safe. Although Berea has maintained compliance with the Lead and Copper rules, water quality everywhere is now under scrutiny and questioned.

Berea, realizing the need to be progressive, voluntarily started a “corrosion control study” in January of 2017. We are working closely with the Ohio EPA and experts in the drinking water chemistry field, to “optimize” our water so that in the event there is an unknown lead exposure in your home’s plumbing, our water will be the least corrosive to it.

Over the years, Berea has continued to invest in the treatment plant, equipment, personnel, and distribution system to stay ahead of failures and to be able to supply our community with no restrictions on water usage. We are and will stay focused on watermain replacements. A vast majority of our water mains were installed during the post war boom in the 1950’s. Those pipes are now terribly rusted and tuberculated. They cause discolored/rusty water. They lack reliable service, and experience high break rates. We understand the inconveniences these old watermains cause our customers and we are increasing our efforts to replace them.