PITY THE POOR MALTHUSIANS:

Modesto's two plants pump out nearly 15 million treated gallons a day. The initial processing at Sutter strips out solids. Then the city pumps the water to Jennings, where further treatment breaks down organic matter and any remaining solids with digesting protozoa "bugs." Last, the water is zapped with UV lights to disinfect it.

Jennings is a vast complex that stretches over 5,000 acres, 1,000 of which are oxidation ponds extending nearly as far as the eye can see. The ponds look more like a nature preserve than a sewage treatment facility, attracting birds and birders.

Anhalt tours us around a number of structures at Jennings--sometimes testing doors to see if they're unlocked, because she forgot her keys. She easily rattles off descriptions of the complicated processes at work. For her, this is second nature. She's been working in wastewater for 23 years.

At an aromatic tank of "mixed liquor," which contains raw wastewater and microorganisms that break down its contents, she seems pleased to be the overseer of such an enormous, complicated system. "Good stuff. It looks pretty," Anhalt says, nodding at the brown liquid rippling with bubbles. "Not too foamy."

Later we visit what she frames as the pièce de résistance: "You just have to see the blowers." As we wend our way through another building, a muted buzzing sound slowly builds to a deep whooshing. These machines aerate the membrane tanks to encourage processing.

"I'm so excited," she smiles. "I love the blowers."

After treatment is done, Modesto uses the water to irrigate city-owned land and sends any left over into the San Joaquin River to flow to users downstream.

By the end of the year, that should change. A refurbished pump station at Jennings will send most of the wastewater into a new $100 million, six-mile pipeline. That will feed into the Delta-Mendota irrigation canal, which ferries water to farmers as part of the Central Valley Project, a federal system that manages and doles out water in the area.

The Delta-Mendota Canal. (Dave Parker)

Ultimately, Modesto's wastewater will reach farms about 20 miles away in the northwestern San Joaquin Valley, where growers on 45,000 acres of farmland in the Del Puerto Water District have struggled to water their crops since the drought began. By 2045, when all phases of the project are complete, these farmers should be receiving nearly 60,000 acre-feet per year from the North Valley project--enough to fill roughly 30,000 Olympic-sized swimming pools.

Anthea Hansen, head of the Del Puerto Water District, is the one who pulled the entire project together. She's been working nonstop for the past seven years to bring more water to farmers there.

Tweet   @brothersjudd