WEFTEC'97® Pays Tribute to the Clean Water Act's 25th Anniversary

One of the major themes of WEFTEC'97®, the annual conference and exposition of the Water Environment Federation (WEF) which just concluded in Chicago, was recognizing the 25th year of the Clean Water Act. First enacted in 1972 as an amendment of an earlier law, and amended itself several times since then, this piece of legislation was the trigger that set off a huge, expensive program to protect and improve the quality of water in the rivers, lakes, wetlands, estuaries and coastal regions of the United States.

To do this, improvements had to be made in treating the wastewater generated by people, industry and commerce before its disposal. And the single most important group of people responsible for the significant improvements that were called for and have been made in the last quarter century have to be the professionals (and the staff at all levels who work for them) who are members of WEF.

The scope of this year's event illustrates how large and complex the wastewater industry has become. The five-day Chicago meeting was the WEF's largest ever (again). Rounding out the numbers there were 16,000 attendees, 700 exhibitors, 80 technical sessions featuring 500 presentations, plus technical symposia and training workshops. The WEF office also reported that there were attendees/presenters from all 50 states and from 59 foreign countries. Among the latter were 10 trade delegations from Asian countries.

Reflecting the growing global outreach interests of the federation, six new member association (MAs) from overseas were added to the roster during the meeting. This brings the MA total outside North America to 28. Within the U.S and Canada there are 45. The new member countries are Hungary, Malaysia, Mexico, Palestine, Singapore and Thailand.

Fittingly, the keynote speaker at the conference's opening session on Monday, October 20, was William D. Ruckelshaus, the United States Environmental Protection Agency's (EPA) first administrator, and in that position when the Clean Water Act became law. And having been called back to head the Agency a second time in the 1980s by the Reagan Administration, he is uniquely qualified to talk about the progress in water quality improvements in the U.S. since 1972. The thrust of his message to the WEF members in Chicago was that much still must be accomplished, especially in the area of non-point pollution.