Costa Mesa in piping plan

Plant in Huntington would need to bury 6 miles of pipeline under city.The heated debate over a controversial desalination plant planned for Huntington Beach hasn’t crossed the border into Costa Mesa, but a pipeline from the plant would.

Huntington Beach officials will hold a key vote Monday on whether to grant permits to build the Poseidon plant, a $250-million facility designed to convert 50 million gallons of seawater per day to drinking water.

If the project is built, it will include a 10-mile pipeline, about six miles of which would go through Costa Mesa to connect with an existing water line on Del Mar Street near the Costa Mesa Freeway (55).

Three routes for the pipeline are proposed, with the main route entering Costa Mesa along Adams Avenue and turning south on Placentia Avenue. It would then skirt the northern edge of Fairview Park and the Costa Mesa Golf Course and extend to Harbor Boulevard, turn east on Fair Drive and end at Del Mar and Orange avenues.

The pipeline would use public rights-of-way, so it would require approval from Costa Mesa staff members but not the City Council. The city already has sent comments on the project to Huntington Beach and will require a plan to deal with traffic during construction, said Costa Mesa associate engineer Raja Sethuraman.

“We told them they can’t close any streets,” he said. “If they work on Adams, they’ll have to do it at night.”

Some residents are still apprehensive. Sandra Genis, a former mayor of Costa Mesa, said she’s concerned about traffic and construction noise from the pipeline project.

“Nobody in Costa Mesa had really been aware of it, and it’s going to be a mess,” she said.

Genis also wondered where the equipment staging areas will be. Some of those details have yet to be worked out, because the project has not yet been approved.

“If the project gets approved by the Huntington Beach City Council, they still have multiple levels to go through,” including the Coastal Commission, Huntington Beach associate planner Ricky Ramos said.

* ALICIA ROBINSON covers government and politics. She may be reached at (714) 966-4626 or by e-mail at alicia.robinson@latimes.com.

20051013he5092kfDON LEACH / DAILY PILOT(LA)A desalination facility could be built behind near this power plant in Huntington Beach. Part of a pipeline for the facility would run through Costa Mesa.