The water works system was established on February 19, 1930 by a vote of the registered electors of the Town of Summerville.
Over the years, the system has been expanded to serve the residents of the Town of Summerville and certain areas beyond the Town limits. The first water plant was located on East Doty Street next to the current Summerville-Dorchester Museum and included four wells, an elevated water tank and a storage facility. This plant was replaced in 1951 by the water treatment plant located on Bacons Bridge Road and the Ashley River. In 1979, SCPW began using deep wells (1,800 ft deep) and maintained a connection with Charleston Water System that was established in 1937. The water treatment plant remained active until 1991.
On July 28, 1992, the Commissioners approved a contract and resolution creating the Lake Moultrie Water Agency. A 24 mgd (million gallons per day) surface water plant, with expansion capability, was built on Lake Moultrie by Santee Cooper at a cost of $36,000,000. Four local utilities joined the Agency: Summerville CPW, Moncks Corner Public Works Commission, the City of Goose Creek and Berkeley County Water & Sanitation Authority. Summerville CPW began receiving all of its water from the Santee Cooper Regional Water System in October 1994 and increased water production to 10 mgd. The Santee Cooper Regional Water System expanded to 40 mgd in 2018 with Summerville CPW’s capacity increasing to 18 mgd. The water line serving Summerville CPW is approximately 20 miles in length.
The current water system also includes three emergency standby wells capable of producing 4.5 million gallons of water per day, an emergency connection with Charleston Water System for an additional 1.5 million gallons of water per day and nine storage facilities with a combined capacity of 4.5 million gallons.
The water distribution system contains over 387 miles of pipe ranging in diameter from one inch (1") to twentyfour inches (24"). Summerville CPW has over 2,128 fire hydrants, 7,521 valves and over 28,337 meters included in the system.
Summerville CPW currently has over 27,887 customers who use approximately 9.25 million gallons of water each day. The peak day demand for the system exceeded 15.9 million gallons per day in May 2019.