What's In Your Water?
When is the last time you took a moment to stop, and smell your water? A continuous supply of clean and safe drinking water is something that most people take for granted. We rarely go to the tap doubting that the water will be clean and safe. Recently, the general population and water supply professionals have become concerned about the safety and protection of our drinking water supplies. Many important steps have been taken, and continue to be taken, by drinking water utilities to prevent possible attacks on water utility infrastructure, and to prevent any attempts to contaminate reservoirs or treated water supplies. Unfortunately for all of us, many of the chemicals that could be used to contaminate a water supply are relatively easy to obtain. With this understood, many of the nation's public drinking water management systems are in a heightened state of readiness to face new threats. Our current main lines of defense are denial of access to our watersheds and distribution system. What is needed is a redundant treatment system at the point of entry.
The Funding Gap
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has conducted a study "The clean water and drinking water infrastructure GAP analysis". This analysis confirms a funding gap that will result if we ignore the challenges posed by an aging infrastructure network - a significant portion of which is beginning to reach its useful design life. This funding gap does not take into consideration added expenses with relation to Homeland Security.
An Aging Infrastructure
Tests have shown in some locations; though water leaves an updated municipal treatment plant that complies with all U.S. EPA criteria, events occurring in the water distribution system after the water leaves the plant can lead to significant spikes in contamination levels! Scales in plumbing lines often exceed the federal government's toxicity characterization leaching procedure (TCCP) limits - making those deposits by definition a hazardous waste. U.S. EPA field engineers have discovered that: "Regulated inorganic and radiological contaminants present in distribution systems to a significant number of times above their respective standards and that this is a largely unknown, unexplored, and universal phenomenon". The researchers urge more effective control schemes that include the use of point of entry water treatment inside the home to provide safeguard barriers for consumers' public health protection.
What Have We Learned From Historical Natural Disasters?
Great disasters such as the great Mississippi River flood of 1993, the 1994 Northridge, California and 1995 Kobe, Japan earthquakes, and Hurricane Floyd in 1999 have taught utilities many lessons about what it takes to survive disasters. Paradoxically, what utilities have learned from these disasters, is they become more vulnerable over time because of growth, aging infrastructure, limited funding, and a growing complexity of systems. Disasters can cause waterborne disease outbreaks, and these disease outbreaks can themselves become disasters. Assessing the risks is difficult because there are so many possibilities. Add to all of this, threats revealed since September 11, 2001; new threats from terrorists and a clear picture develops that consumers need a point of entry protection for their water supply.
The Harmsco® WaterGuard® Filtration Appliance offers multiple layers of protection: First, an anti-microbial pre-filtration media containing Silver Zeolite, then a massive activated carbon block, next a 1 micron absolute Cyst rated filtration media, certified to remove cryptosporidium and giardia, and finally a complex ultra violet reactor to sterilize any living organisms that may have made it through. With filtration run-times of around one year between filter cartridge change-outs, you won’t have to worry about any Boil Water notices or your ice cubes tasting like chlorine! For more information on the WaterGuard® whole-house Filtration System, visit www.harmsco.com/z/wg, www.Harmsco.com, or call us today at 800-327-3248 or 561-848-9628.