San Diego County's investment in the western hemisphere's largest desalination plant is only a few months away from beginning to pay dividends.
Construction of the Carlsbad plant is 85 percent complete, and it remains on track to begin producing fresh water this fall.
The facility will generate 50 million gallons of potable water a day.
Poseidon Water is building the billion dollar plant and company spokeswoman Jessica Jones said it will provide a drought proof supply of water.
"The plant will serve about 300,000 people, which is about seven percent of San Diego County's water supply," Jones said.
The facility will force 100 million gallons of ocean water through reverse osmosis filters each day. Those filters will likely not get installed until summer.
Jones said the plant's pretreatment systems are already being tested.
"We are running the seawater through our pretreatment system. We are testing that system and backwashing the system and sending that seawater back out into the ocean."
