Advancing Water Quality Through Proven Solutions and Testing

Every August, National Water Quality Month serves as a reminder of something we focus on year-round: managing water, the world’s most precious resource. It sustains ecosystems, supports agriculture and protects public health. But preserving water quality doesn’t happen on its own. It takes intentional design, proven infrastructure and a long-term commitment to getting it right, even when it’s not easy.

At Advanced Drainage Systems, water quality is central to our mission. You can even find it in our tagline – Our Reason is Water. We capture, convey, store and treat water before it’s returned to the environment with a clear goal in mind: cleaner water and a brighter future for the communities we serve.

Solutions Built for the First Drop

Water quality protection begins when runoff starts. ADS offers a complete suite of solutions to intercept and remove pollutants before they reach the watershed, each engineered to exceed industry performance standards.

“We design systems that solve real challenges on real job sites,” said Joe Chylik, Product Director of Water Quality at ADS. “Whether it’s sediment, metals, hydrocarbons, or nutrients, our goal is to remove those pollutants before they ever reach sensitive ecosystems.”

The Arcadia™ Hydrodynamic Separator uses advanced flow technology to capture sediment and debris, with flexible configurations and easy maintenance from the surface. The EcoStream™ BioFilter targets fine particles, nutrients, metals, and hydrocarbons through a combination of sedimentation, filtration, adsorption, and biological processes — with New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection (NJDEP) and Washington State Department of Ecology (WADOE) performance approvals.

For underground storage systems, the StormTech® Isolator® Row PLUS captures the “first flush” of runoff, isolating sediment in a single row for efficient maintenance while achieving over 80% TSS removal. At the surface, FlexStorm® Inlet Filters provide a simple, adaptable solution for capturing debris and sediment at inlets before it enters the stormwater system.

Together, these treatment products work at multiple points within the system to remove pollutants, protect downstream infrastructure and safeguard water resources for the long term.

Testing That Drives Confidence

At our Engineering and Technology Center in Hilliard, Ohio, we’re pushing stormwater science forward every day. The Hydraulics Lab plays a key role in that effort. Equipped with a 90,000-gallon closed-loop water system stored underground, the lab recreates complex flow scenarios that mirror the real world without wasting resources.

“We simulate the kinds of conditions our systems face in the field, then we test how our products hold up and where we can make them even better,” said Chris Stoneburg, Director of Product Development. “Everything we learn here feeds directly into our product development and helps our partners specify with confidence.”

Whether we’re measuring pollutant removal rates, validating flow performance, or assessing long-term maintenance needs, our work in the lab ensures every water quality product performs as designed and gives our customers the data they need to make informed decisions.

A Broader Commitment to a Cleaner Future

Protecting water starts with more than just treatment technology. It takes shared knowledge, strong partnerships, and a commitment to long-term performance and sustainability.

We equip engineers, contractors, and municipalities with tools like the Arcadia 3D Design Tool, backed by technical expertise in the field. We develop each system to deliver reliable treatment while supporting site designs that protect surrounding waterways.

National Water Quality Month is a reminder of why this work matters, but our focus is year-round. Every separator we test, every filtration system we install and every solution we refine is part of our mission to protect water for the next generation.

See how we protect water quality at every stage: adspipe.com/water-quality