Supervisory control and data acquisition (SCADA) is a term used ubiquitously throughout the automation world. Supervisory control is monitoring and control of plant equipment from a central location. Data acquisition is the collection and storage of plant data, which is readily available for plant staff use. In the past, many SCADA system designs were tailored primarily to customers' monitoring and control needs, and data acquisition was often overlooked. Today, however, regulatory agencies are establishing stringent requirements on water quality. To meet these requirements, municipalities are increasingly allocating more resources for automating data collection and plant report generation. This paper investigates various technologies and methodologies for data collection, storage, and reporting. Database packages that are commonly used for data storage, such as Industrial SQL Server by Wonderware, and the iHistorian by Intellution, are explained. Data collection methodologies, such as cyclical storage and report-by-exception are discussed. Several report generation tools, such as SyTech XLReporter and Microsoft Access are presented. The paper concludes with an explanation of actual reports developed for a municipal water treatment plant. Includes 8 references, figure.