Local water testing protocols guard against Flint-like contamination
Joe Lanzafame filled two beakers from the lab faucets and raised each to eye level.
Instead of the brownish cast now infamous in Flint, Mich., the supply from the New London public water treatment plant at Lake Konomoc in Waterford looked clear and clean, equally so directly from the main reservoir and after treatment, the water customers use for drinking, bathing and cooking. The system serves about 7,000 homes, businesses and institutions in New London and Waterford.
"This is the raw water," Lanzafame, director of public utilities, said Wednesday, holding up a sample that looked identical to another that had been chemically treated and deemed safe for the public. "You look at that and it's pretty clean. When you're starting out at this point, it makes your life a lot easier."
With Flint's lead-tainted water supply attracting ongoing national attention, local officials are keenly aware that the public may be wondering about the quality of what comes out of their own home faucets, no longer sure they can take its safety for granted.
For Mae Wu, senior attorney in the health program at the Natural Resources Defense Council, the problems in Flint demonstrate that people need to pay closer attention to public water supplies. Last week, the nonprofit group joined the Michigan ACLU and other groups in a lawsuit against Flint and the state of Michigan for violating the federal Safe Drinking Water Act. The suit calls for prompt replacement of lead pipes in the city at no cost to residents, and strict adherence to testing and treatment to control for lead, among other actions.
"What this should tell people is that we should be more vigilant, more proactive, and ask to have our own tap water tested," she said.
Testing is most important for people who have lived in their homes more than 50 years old and could still have lead pipes, she said. Lead, which was banned from new construction in recent decades, leached out of Flint's pipes due to corrosive and inadequately treated water from the Flint River, causing levels of the neurotoxin far in excess of federal safe drinking water limits, potentially causing long-term health and developmental problems that are particularly worrisome for children.
"Flint is really an example of how badly a water maintenance program can be run," Wu said.
At Norwich Public Utilities, which serves 11,000 customers in Norwich and six surrounding towns and Mohegan Sun, water treatment plant officials say rigorous regular testing is the norm. State regulations require checks for various quality measures at intervals ranging from daily tests to once every three years, they say, and there have been no recent violations. Up to 12,000 samples a year are tested for bacteria, disinfectant byproducts, pesticides and other contaminants from dozens of locations throughout the system, from schools to fire houses to the treatment plant. Some of the tests are done at the treatment plant lab, while other samples are sent to certified independent labs, with the results going to the state.
The system draws its water from the Deep River reservoir in Lebanon and the Stony Brook reservoir in Montville. At the treatment plant in Lebanon, alum, chlorine, caustic soda, fluoride and phosphates are added to purify the water and prevent corrosion of the system's cast iron pipes, and real-time monitoring checks ensure the levels of each of the chemicals are within safe limits, Deborah Ouellette, chief of water plant operations, said. The water is filtered to remove organic particles — everything from plant debris, rocks and dirt to animal waste — before entering the 200 miles of supply pipes.
"This is a very, very highly regulated operation," she said, referring to a computer monitor on the wall of the lab displaying up-to-the-minute water chemistry data.
Testing for lead happens every three years, she explained. Systems such as Norwich's and New London's that haven't had a recent sample with excessive lead are permitted by the state Department of Public Health to conduct the test at the longer interval. Otherwise the testing is required every six months. The water sample for the lead tests, done in tandem with tests for copper residues, which also can cause harmful health effects at high levels, are collected from taps at more than 30 locations, mostly homes. In New London, samples are collected from more than 20 homes and at other sites.
"We rely on our customers to do the sampling," Ouellette said.
Under the state-approved testing plan, older homes are selected throughout the system because they are the most likely to have the highest lead levels. Customers who agree to participate are given instructions about how to collect the sample, which is then collected by NPU workers and sent to an independent lab.
"They have to take the first draw after the water's been sitting in the faucet for at least six hours," Ouellette explained. "Then they let it run for 10 minutes and take a second sample. After that it goes directly to the lab."
NPU is next scheduled to test for lead and copper this spring. In New London, the testing will be done in 2017.
Low alkalinity
One of the reasons the public water supplies at NPU, New London and other systems around the state have relatively few contamination problems, Ouellette said, is that state laws prohibit the discharges of any wastewater — treated or not — into drinking water supplies. Watersheds — the land surrounding reservoirs and public supply wells — are similarly protected. NPU, for example, owns about 1,400 acres of open space around its Deep River Reservoir, and staff patrol the property regularly.
Another attribute of local water supplies — as well as those throughout most of New England — is that most have a nearly neutral pH, said Lanzafame, the New London utilities director. Flint River water, by contrast, has a low pH and high acidity, making it highly corrosive to pipes and causing lead to leach out. In addition, officials there opted not to add phosphorous, an anti-corrosive used by both NPU and New London and many other systems nationwide.
"In New England, our waters tend to be of medium to low alkalinity," Lanzafame said, as he conducted a daily pH test on a sample of treated water. "The water coming out of Lake Konomoc has a pH of 7.2 to 7.3" – slightly above the neutral level of 7. That day's sample of treated water, he noted, had a pH of 6.81, a "fairly typical" level within the desired range.
Samples for tests not done in-house by the New London system are sent to a lab in Rhode Island or to the lab at Groton Public Utilities. Joyce Brown, water quality manager there, said her lab also tests samples for concerned customers served by the Groton system who request it. Both New London and Groton provide the service to customers at no charge, she said. There have not been any recent requests in response to the crisis in Flint, she said.
Complaints about the quality of the water from the New London system are few, Lanzafame said, but if a customer is concerned, the city will collect a sample and have it tested. Sometimes, water quality can change after a fire in the neighborhood that caused firefighters to draw large volumes from hydrants, for example.
"We will do that for people if they have concerns," he said.
j.benson@theday.com
Twitter: @BensonJudy
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