WOW looks to conserve water

But it takes a lot of work to bring those exhibits to public view, not the least of which is making sure the creatures have a hospitable environment in which to live.

The facility holds about 700,000 gallons of water at one time, and all of that water must go through several processes before it can be used in the center. Then it must go through several more processes before it can be released back into the general supply.

“When it enters our building it goes through our carbon filtration system and then our water softening system,” said Clifford Clark, director of operations for WOW. “Then we put ozone in the water, which kills all the bacteria in it. We clean it to take out everything the city puts in it to make it healthy to drink, and then we run it through filters that put the necessary elements back in it – the animals have to have some ammonia and some nutrients in the water.”

Salinity and temperature are then adjusted according to what tank will be using the water.

Water, water everywhere

Keeping the water suitable for the animals is no small task.

The museum houses some 45 tanks, about half of which are visible to the general public. And though there’s a lot of water going through the facility – some 7 million gallons weekly – much of that water is reused multiple times.

“As it circulates, it goes through protein skimmers that take out excess protein, it goes through sand filters to take any excess particulate out of the water, and then it’s re-circulated through our aquariums,” Clark said.

Once the facility is done with the water, it runs through the same filtering process – sand filters, carbon filtering, ozone addition. Some of the water is released into the city’s sanitary sewer, but some, according to chief engineer Dan Dibble, gets filtered and used again.

And there’s good reason. Every time the system is back flushed, where water is run back through the filters to clean them, “it costs nearly $1,000,” Dibble said.

It’s not just the safety of the fish that encourages museum officials to keep the water clean, either.

“The fish can live in the water if it’s a little murky,” Dibble said, “but if you can’t see them they don’t bring in any revenue.”

Conservation

Reusing water is not the only conservation effort WOW makes. Spokesman Gary Ellison said the museum’s conservation efforts

are numerous, including two programs with Southwest Missouri State University to study and protect the hellbender salamander and the river otter.

Education continues to be the group’s first conservation tactic. The facility houses some 225 different species, and many of them are used in the museum’s outreach programs, traveling to schools and nursing homes for demonstrations.

Ellison said the organization’s conservation efforts fit right in with its mission.

“Our mission statement is to educate, inform and entertain our visitors about the necessity in our life of having wild places and wild animals and to get people involved in the outdoors,” he said. “Our goal would be to protect these species and have them thrive in their environment with clean water, clean air, so that future generations can enjoy them as well.”

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