Although the rebuilt facility was commissioned in January, the city on Friday officially announced the completion of an upgrade to the Honouliuli Wastewater Treatment Plant in Ewa, a federally ordered project costing a whopping $536 million.

The improvements, enabling full secondary treatment, mean that the water released is nonpotable but recyclable for landscaping and other purposes. The city now turns the page on a longstanding environmental failing at a plant that discharged effluent endangering health. Next chapter: similar upgrades at the Sand Island plant, due by 2035.