Regulation Updates For Utility Managers
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Calling On Utilities To Combat Legionella
5/5/2022
The risk level linked to delivered drinking water from municipal utilities is very small, even if some high-profile examples of failure (see Flint, MI) have degraded public confidence to a degree. Our treatment professionals usually hit their targets, so the onus then shifts to the research and guidance that determines the safe level of various constituents through U.S. EPA protocols. But there is one contaminant that rulemaking hasn’t quite caught up to and which is downright deadly — Legionella pneumophila.
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Multidistrict Litigation Suit For PFAS Contamination Gains Momentum
4/13/2022
Water system providers across the U.S. have joined a multidistrict litigation (MDL) suit claiming that their water supplies are contaminated with per- and poly-fluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) from aqueous film-forming foam (AFFF). These chemicals have been used for decades to extinguish chemical or petroleum fires at military bases, airports, and industrial facilities.
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Mini Superstars For Aquatic Research: Stable Isotopes
3/30/2022
Monitoring the nation’s water quality is a fundamental part of EPA’s work. As part of the Clean Water Act, EPA monitors the condition of U.S. waters through a program called the National Aquatic Resource Surveys (NARS). This is a collaborative program between EPA, states, and Tribes designed to assess the quality of the nation's coastal waters, lakes, reservoirs, rivers, streams and wetlands.
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Reconsidering 'Environmental Racism'
3/23/2022
Water Online recently published an article for Water Innovations on environmental racism — Environmental Racism In America: How It's Affecting Vulnerable Communities — and I paused during the editing process to consider watering down the key phrase to "environmental injustice" before ultimately deciding that I might also be watering down the transgression itself. However, the very consideration made me wonder why I had the instinct to tone it down in the first place.
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EPA Researchers Share Approaches To Identify Lead Service Lines
3/16/2022
Lead is one of the most challenging contaminants affecting our drinking water. Lead can enter drinking water from a variety of plumbing materials installed prior to its ban. The most common sources of lead in drinking water are old lead service lines, lead-containing faucets, other lead-containing plumbing fixtures and leaded solder joints.
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VOCs For Non-Scientists: Understanding, Detecting, Removing
3/14/2022
This introduction to volatile organic compounds (VOCs) will discuss what qualifies a compound as a VOC, how to detect them, and how to treat and remove these chemicals from the water system.
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Minimizing Disinfection Byproducts By Targeting Natural Organic Matter Precursors
3/4/2022
Water treatment plants (WTPs) need to lean less on the disinfection process strategies (i.e., chloramination) and instead focus on more comprehensive DBP solutions such as removing TOC. Here's why.
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How Cities Leverage Machine Learning To Expedite Lead Service Line Removal
2/10/2022
An interview with Kristin Epstein, PE, Assistant Director of Department of Water and Sewer (Trenton Water Works), City of Trenton, New Jersey.
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Refining GAC Solution Costs For PFAS And Other Contaminants
2/3/2022
Whether a water treatment plant (WTP) is evaluating a new granular activated carbon (GAC) solution to deal with contamination problems such as PFAS, DBPs, and VOCs or looking to enhance existing GAC performance, it is important to assess treatment processes in the full context of source water quality. Here are some ideas to help decision-makers achieve the best outcomes at the lowest total lifecycle cost.
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New Hampshire Puts $350 Million To Work From A Successful Lawsuit Over MTBE Contamination
1/25/2022
From cleaner water to infrastructure upgrades, good stories are easy to find after the state of New Hampshire set out to hold polluters accountable for contaminating groundwater with methyl tertiary-butyl ether (MTBE), a gasoline additive now banned or limited in several states. Through private well testing, watershed protection and new water facilities, the people of the Granite State are turning the tide on water contamination and restoring the safety and reliability of their drinking water supplies thanks to bold action to make sure polluters pay for damage.