The Palo Alto Horizontal Levee project is a nature-based solution that provides habitat improvement, public access, flood protection, and water quality improvement.
This project will be the first of its kind to beneficially reuse treated wastewater for irrigation before discharging directly to San Fransico Bay. This project is on the leading edge of a move towards integrated solutions that provide flood protection, combat sea level rise, treat wastewater, and provide enhanced habitat.
ESA designed this multi-benefit project to enhance and expand shoreline habitat along the perimeter of the Harbor Marsh in Palo Alto. The project includes creating a flood protection levee berm with a broad ecotone slope, adaptable to sea level rise, which also treats discharged wastewater from the City of Palo Alto’s Regional Water Quality Control Plant (RWQCP) before it enters the San Francisco Bay. The ecotone slope will feature grassy wet meadows, freshwater/tidal brackish marshes, and riparian scrub – historical transitional habitats decimated by development. This horizontal levee design provides an upland transition zone for marsh vegetation to adapt to rising sea levels while maintaining flood protection for the RWQCP infrastructure and supporting future regional flood protection solutions.
ESA’s design integrates the horizontal levee with regional efforts to protect low-lying infrastructure from sea-level rise, identifying a strategy for obtaining construction permits, incorporating public access, and advancing treatment effectiveness. Designed to accommodate the future construction of a regional flood protection levee between the ecotone slope and Embarcadero Road, the team leverages their experience from the successful Oro Loma Sanitary District Waste Water Treatment Plant project to expand similar initiatives around the San Francisco Bay’s perimeter.
"This project represents a major step forward for innovative design and nature-based solutions in the SF Bay. It highlights our ability to co-create solutions inspired by nature and we are excited to be part of the work."
Client San Francisco Estuary Partnership (as part of the Association of Bay Area Governments and the Metropolitan Commission), City of Palo Alto
Location Palo Alto, CA
Market Water
ESA working with Subcontractors to take soils samples from deep underground.
In support of our increasingly in-demand Energy Market Team, Environmental Science Associates (ESA) has recently...
Battery energy storage provides numerous benefits: it can prevent power outages, maximize the utilization of...
The energy landscape is changing rapidly—and with it comes a growing need for efficient and...
It’s been weeks since the event, but I’m still reflecting on the 2024 Mobility 21...
On December 10, 2024, the U.S. Supreme Court heard oral arguments on Seven County Infrastructure...
After the presidential election, our cultural resources experts are watching for significant adjustments to cultural...
