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Learn some of the many ways EWEB customers support local schools and help inspire kids to explore the wonders of watershed health and clean energy resources.
Find Out MoreNational Infrastructure Week (May 14-20) may be a politically charged quip on the national stage, but for EWEB, the urgency and importance of infrastructure is no joke.
Find Out MoreA wrap up of the May 2nd EWEB Board of Commissioners Meeting
Find Out MoreMillions of dollars of investment have prevented the major harm from the Holiday Farm Fire, EWEB’s annual State of the Watershed Report finds.
Find Out MoreEWEB employs multiple methods of safeguarding drinking water, from the source to the tap.
Find Out MoreFollow along as the Currin Substation, the first of 10 substations in 10 years, is rebuilt from the ground up as part of EWEB's Capital Improvement Plan for major infrastructure investments to rehabilitate, replace, and install new infrastructure.
Find Out MoreThe EWEB Board of Commissioners discussed prefunding Leaburg, the 2022 State of the Watershed report, and the General Manager's performance evaluation at their April 4th, 2023 meeting.
Find Out MoreOld reservoir leaks, threatening water quality, and will fail when a major earthquake strikes.
Find Out MoreCrews are identifying and addressing equipment failures before wildfire season and doing so mitigates risk of fire ignition.
Find Out MoreEWEB customers use more than twice as much water in the hot, dry summer months, compared to the cold, rainy winter months. The higher summer water use can almost assuredly be attributed to customers watering their lawns and gardens.
Find Out MoreThe Eugene Water & Electric Board (EWEB) is expanding its capacity to provide water to customers in case of an emergency.
Find Out MoreEWEB is already in compliance with a new proposed federal rule that would require municipalities to test for PFAs, or forever chemicals, in drinking water. The good news for EWEB customers is that in over ten years of testing we have not found PFAs in our water.
Find Out MoreThe EWEB Board of Commissioners meet on the first Tuesday of the month.
Find Out MoreEWEB General Manager Frank Lawson delivered his annual State of the Utility Address at the March 7 public Board of Commissioners meeting.
Find Out MoreEugene is one of the largest cities on the west coast with only a single source of drinking water, the McKenzie River. And though the McKenzie is a pure, reliable water source, EWEB will secure a second source ensure resiliency in the future, planning to build a water treatment plant on the Willamette River, upstream of Eugene and Springfield.
Find Out MoreJune 07, 2022
EWEB Commissioners joined Eugene City Council members and local leaders for a tour of McKenzie River restoration projects, coordinated by EWEB’s Source Water Protection team and our amazing collaborators at McKenzie Watershed Council (MWC), McKenzie River Trust (MRT), and the Willamette National Forest.
The tour focused on the coordinated response to the Holiday Farm Fire, emphasizing the effectiveness of large-scale floodplain enhancement projects for mitigating the impacts of sedimentation and increasing water temperatures.
Tour highlights included stops at Finn Rock Reach and the McKenzie River/South Fork of the McKenzie confluence. At these sites, EWEB, Willamette National Forest, McKenzie River Trust and McKenzie Watershed Council have installed massive projects aiming to restore the river to “Stage 0” conditions, referring to rivers’ natural tendencies to meander throughout a valley floor, to flood wetlands, to send water below the soils in some places (called “hyporheic flow”), and to slow down flows behind obstructions like logjams.
Rivers throughout the world have lost these natural conditions due to pressures from development, as we have altered and managed rivers to protect riverside infrastructure like roads and homes, and due to logging and mining. When the rivers lose their connection to the floodplain and are forced into a single channel, this creates a "firehose effect." The water loses the ability to spread out into the floodplain where the water slows down and drops out sediment and contaminants. Instead, the water flows through the channel at high speeds, carrying sediment and potential contaminants downstream where they can have huge impacts on personal property and infrastructure like roads and our water treatment plant.
By restoring Stage 0 floodplains throughout the McKenzie watershed, EWEB and our partners are restoring river and floodplain functionality to be a first line of defense against threats to drinking water quality. A healthier river can also slow down and store water/larger flow events, provide a haven for wildlife during fire event, and buffer metals, sediment and nutrient loads, and hazardous materials – reducing the work required of our treatment facility.
These projects also create new habitat for endangered salmon, bull trout, Pacific lamprey, and other species, empowering our watershed to protect itself against environmental stressors. In fact, in the first seasons after these projects were completed, redd (salmon nest) counts increased by as much as 20-fold!
“Thanks to all the people who are doing this incredible work, we are restoring and improving the watershed from hundreds of years of human impact,” EWEB Commissioner Sonya Carlson said after the tour. “Getting as close as we can to the natural flow of the waterway clearly has meaningful impact on the native species, our resiliency, and water quality.”
The Commissioners’ tour also visited the Finn Rock Boat landing, where the McKenzie River Trust is fundraising for major improvements, the confluence of Quartz Creek and the McKenzie River, where EWEB and partners are planning another floodplain enhancement project, as well as the former home of Barry Lopez. Lopez, an environmental author who was called a “modern day Thoreau,” lived on and wrote about the McKenzie River for 50 years. He passed away in December of 2020, but now his home serves as a writing retreat and a meeting place for the river conservation community.
Throughout the day, EWEB Commissioners, staff, and partners emphasized how these projects are possible thanks to the collaborative, multi-organizational approach to protecting our watershed and drinking water quality.
We are fortunate to have some of the cleanest drinking water in the country and EWEB's Source Water Protection Program is working to keep it that way. The program's successful track record over two decades enables us to collaborate with McKenzie valley landowners, leverage the diverse expertise of watershed partners, and attract funding support from state and federal sources while setting a national example of watershed protection.
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Mailing Address: 4200 Roosevelt Blvd., Eugene, OR 97402
Phone: 541-685-7000
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Email: eweb.answers@eweb.org
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