Water in Anderson County may taste a bit different now than it used to."Every drop of water that goes through our plant is treated for taste and odor compounds caused by algae in the lake,” said Trey Burns, the source water specialist at Anderson Regional Joint Water System.That lake would be Lake Hartwell, where the plant gets the water for the area’s 200,000 people. "The lake was built in '63, and we saw this huge algal bloom in 2013. A lot of factors contributed. There was never a clear-cut 'this caused it. But i think unfortunately us humans cause a lot of that,” said Burns.So Anderson Regional Joint Water System built a new facility onto the plant in May 2018 to get rid of the algae."What we have now is called ozone treatment process. It's the first thing we do now,” said trey burns, "So algae, unfortunately, is becoming an issue throughout the country."After the water is treated for taste and odor caused by non-toxic algae, it goes to the flash-mixer to gather and filter out all the dirt particles and other gunk called "floc."Then, it's on to the lab for testing.The plant treats 20 million gallons of water everyday.Machines at the plant are always running to track any changes that might be happening. And every hour or more, there's an operator making sure the water is safe to drink.8 water districts, three towns, and the cities of Anderson and Clemson, as well as Clemson University all get their drinking water from Anderson Regional Joint Water System.Now officials there are looking to work with the communities they serve to be mindful about how to keep original source water as pure as possible, so cleaning and treating can safely continue."People think when they dump anything down the storm drain, it goes to a sewer treatment plant - and it does not! It drains directly to a creek, and eventually directly to their drinking water,” said Burns.In July, staff from the Ibaraki Prefecture northeast of Tokyo, Japan visited the Anderson plant to learn about the new Ozone Treatment Process center. Burns tells WYFF4 the water plant on Lake Kasumigaura is experiencing the same taste and odor issues Anderson County was before the put in the center to treat the water for algae.More about Anderson Regional Joint Water System HERE.