https://www.mv-voice.com/environment/2024/03/28/stemming-the-red-tide/

The concrete tank that overlooks the Palo Alto Baylands from Embarcadero Way resembles an industrial-sized Jacuzzi where ducks float through murky, bubbly water, seemingly oblivious to the lightly pungent, industrial scent of the processed sewage.

It is one of four aeration basins that are arranged in a giant square at the city’s Regional Quality Control Plant, a sprawling industrial complex that receives and treats sewage from Palo Alto and its partner agencies of Mountain View, East Palo Alto Sanitary District, Los Altos, Los Altos Hills and Stanford University. Three tanks are currently filled, while the fourth basin sits empty as construction workers fortify its concrete base as part of $369-million upgrade to the treatment plant on Embarcadero Road — the city’s most expensive and most complex ongoing infrastructure project.