Iowa Regional Utilities Association provides a high quality, safe, dependable supply of softened water. In identifying source water, the goal is finding a water supply of superior quality to that available from a typical residential well. IRUA's contracted water sources' quality meets or exceeds state and federal guidelines as outlined in the Safe Drinking Water Act. In addition, our sources soften their water providing some of the best water available for consumption in the state.
Today, Iowa Regional Utilities Association currently contracts with Newton, Marshalltown, and Pella Waterworks for its water supply. Forty year contracts with each of these municipal sources assure water capacity to meet the growing needs of our member-customers. In addition to the current contracted sources, IRUA owns and operates a reverse osmosis water treatment facility located near Waverly.
Water is pumped by large booster stations to 27 water towers strategically located throughout the system, two of which are 2 million gallon hydropillars. Gravitational flow, as well as additional pumping stations, enable the system to provide water service to a growing member-customer base.
The Newton source currently provides more than 900 million gallons of water to IRUA annually. The raw water is pumped from a combination of a Jordan Well and 21 shallow wells located in the South Skunk River Alluvium. The finished water is softened to seven grains of hardness, and iron, calcium, magnesium, and manganese are removed. Newton Waterworks has established a strong partnership with Iowa Regional Utilities Association and continues to be a reliable source.
Water from the Marshalltown source is pumped from the Mississippian aquifer and is treated using a lime soda-ash softening process. The Marshalltown source, which supplies nearly 450 million gallons annually, provides exceptional water quality with finished water softened to between six to eight grains of hardness. Iowa Regional Utilities Association has been a long-time customer of Marshalltown Waterworks.
Pella Waterworks has provided a continued supply of water to the southern portion of Iowa Regional Utilities Association's system. Pella's raw water is drawn from the Cambrian-Jordan and Cambrian-Ordovician aquifers and from Alluvial wells along the Des Moines River. Pella uses a lime softening treatment process which provides for similar water quality to that of Newton and Marshalltown. IRUA also utilizes this dependable source to continuously provide water to a portion of the southern service area and also as a redundant source for the portion of the system supplied by Newton Waterworks.
Our 3 million gallon per day water treatment facility uses a reverse osmosis membrane treatment process. The treatment process removes impurities from raw water which is softened to between six to eight grains of hardness. This water treatment facility has expansion capacity of an additional 3 million gallons per day.
IRUA maintains a network of water mains, booster stations and storage tanks to distribute treated drinking water to residents of 18 counties in central and northeast Iowa. We have 4,656 miles of pipeline in the ground, with sizes from 2” - 20” in diameter, 1” and 1 ½” service lines. IRUA also has 27 towers with a total storage capacity of 12,300,000 gallons, and more than 14,855 meters throughout the distribution system.
Iowa Regional Utilities Association provides wastewater services to Whitten (1998), Hunter’s Ridge near Pella (1999), The Harvester (2000), Pine Lake near Eldora (2001), Rustic Ridges near Grinnell (2001), IDOT-Grinnell rest area (2001), IDNR-Rock Creek State Park (2001), Lakeview Heights, Diehl’s Acres and Homesites Subdivisions near Rock Creek (2003-2004), Colo Business Park (2003), Haverhill (2003), Lincoln (2004), Pollard Development near Grinnell (2004), St. Anthony (2005), Morrison (2006), Grundy County Industrial Park (2006), Oakland Acres (2007), Park Hills (2009), I-35 Dows Interchange (2009), Stout and Camp Wallashuck (2011), North Overlook (2015) and Red Rock Marina (2016).