Six students who participated in the Irvine Unified School District’s science fair on February 5 were selected for honors by Irvine Ranch Water District for their water-related science fair projects.

IRWD has been involved in the science fair since its inception more than 30 years ago. District professionals have assisted, whether it’s advising during Ask-a-Scientist Night, or judging the water-related science fair projects.

Of the several hundred entries, more than 30 were water-related. Some examined various methods of desalination, some examined irrigation controllers and others conducted experiments on removing certain constituents from water.

Judging this year were Toni Lynch of Engineering, Dorien McElroy of Collection Systems, Mo Wise of Natural Treatment Systems and Enrique Zanetti of Water Resources.

Students whose projects were selected are:

• Aaryan Mukherjee, sixth grade, Cypress Village Elementary School, “How to Revolutionize the Process of Watering Your Plants: Soil Moisture Sensors”
• Aran Mohsenzadeh and Sriram Vaidhyanathan, sixth grade, Cypress Village Elementary School, “Cleaning Up the Microplastics from the Ocean Using Ferrofluids"
• Matthew Chang, seventh grade, South Lake Middle School, "Climate Change on Growth of Land and Marine Plants"
• Katherine Robertson, eighth grade, Beacon Park K-8 School, “Eutrophication Predicting System” 
• Patrick Zhang, eleventh grade, University High School, “The Effects of Mesopaper, Activated Charcoal, and KDF on Ni2+ Concentrations in Water”

For more information on the IRWD educational programs, please visit our website.

At IRWD, the health and safety of customers is our top priority. Therefore, all of our buildings — including our Customer Service desk and Engineering counter — are temporarily closed to the public until further notice. During this time, we will not be charging late fees or disconnecting water service, unless due to repairs or maintenance. Please check back at IRWD.com for the latest news and updates.

Meanwhile, almost all transactions with IRWD can be conducted by internet, email or phone. 

So please click or call for all your service needs. Just visit IRWD.com/services for handy links. Or dial 949-453-5300.

Full service by phone is available from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Thursday.

We appreciate your patience as we take these steps to help protect our community from the spread of COVID-19. You can be assured that your drinking water is safe and that the IRWD staff remains hard at work to continue delivering reliable water, sewer and other services.

Customer services available online and by phone include all billing issues, meters and leaks, rates and charges, water efficiency rebates, start/stop service, water variance requests, engineering documents, and much more. Payments can be made online, by phone or placed in the parking lot drop box at 15600 Sand Canyon Ave., Irvine. 

If you are experiencing financial difficulties, you can contact Customer Service by phone or email. See our Bill Payment Questions webpage for more information.

Please visit IRWD.com/services for links to available services.

You’ll also find links to help you save water and money: Learn how to detect leaks. And apply for rebates on turf removal, smart irrigation controllers, water-efficient sprinkler nozzles and more.

We want to assure our customers that your drinking water is safe and reliable. The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) has no impact on the quality of your drinking water. IRWD is also taking steps to ensure that service to our customers will continue uninterrupted so your drinking water is both available and plentiful.

Most of IRWD’s drinking water comes from deep groundwater wells, which do not contain viruses or other pathogenic organisms.  Some of our water supply comes from imported surface water, which receives advanced water treatment that removes all microorganisms including viruses. All water is dosed with chlorine before entering the water distribution system to ensure that it stays safe through our system to your home.

IRWD water quality staff continuously monitors our water supply, conducting more than a quarter of a million laboratory tests each year on water taken from more than 100 sample points. We have a state-of-the-art and certified Water Quality Laboratory.  IRWD's commitment to innovation makes it one of the best-equipped water labs in Southern California. Results of these lab tests are published in the Annual Water Quality report and show that IRWD drinking water meets or exceeds all quality standards set by both the state and federal government.

Fact sheet on safety of state public drinking water: Reminder about California’s drinking water systems (State-required treatment process removes viruses, including COVID-19)

Save a trip: Email or call us

We’d also like to remind all of our customers that you can save a trip into the IRWD Customer Service Counter by simply calling or emailing us. Did you know that customers can conduct nearly all transactions with the IRWD Customer Service Department by phone or email? 949-453-5300, customerservice@irwd.com or irwd.com/services.

Health care precautions are always important, but as people increase their use of disinfecting wipes to stave off infection by COVID-19, IRWD wants to remind customers not to flush them. Please throw them away.

These wipes are not flushable and can easily snag onto imperfections in pipelines, accumulating with other debris to create severe clogs in your home’s plumbing or the water district’s sewer lines.

Remember that the toilet is not a trash can. Flush only the three P’s: pee, poo and paper.

Click here for more information.