This week's NEWS

Oh, what a tangled web we weave, when first we practice to deceive... or when we make any change in the treatment scheme. Where is the largest UF plant in Germany? WHO report on meeting the goals of providing safe drinking water around the world. What is the best ad to convince Australians to drink recycled water?

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NDMA

• WHO drinking water guidelines: Draft background document on NDMA is available for public comment until November 30

Perchlorate

• Editorial: Proposed new California MCL balances health concerns with scientific and economic realities (Riverside Press-Enterprise, September 5)
• AWWA describes California proposed MCL and reports on Los Alamos research to find new explosives free of lead and perchlorate (WaterWeek, September 4)
• Citizens told that cleanup of Southern California groundwater basin may take decades; more lawsuits and hearings planned (Riverside Press-Enterprise, September 1)
• Perchlorate is part of San Gabriel Valley, CA, cleanup: 20 years, 20 treatment plants, and another $0.5 billion needed (San Gabriel Valley Tribune, September 3)

Risk Assessment

• Chemical Mixtures: Is there a risk greater than from the individual chemicals? (Environmental Health Perspectives, September)
  Commentary: This scholarly exchange of letters helps put this issue in perspective but doesn't give a bottom-line answer. The researcher has done extensive work on the effect of potential endocrine-disrupting compounds on amphibians.

Microbiological

• Dr. Charles Gerba – Germs, ahoy! (Globe and Mail, September 2)
  WARNING!  Do not read this article right before eating... or right after you have used a public restroom! (Not related to drinking water)

Water Treatment

• Germany's largest ultrafiltration WTP; membranes precede Fe and Mn removal
• Slightly elevated TTHMs leads another California water district to switch to chloramines (North County Times, September 2); Elsinore Valley MWD provides consumers with information on the change

Lead

• Very high lead levels found in small Maine housing-project system (Kennebec Journal, September 2)
  Commentary: Unintended consequences? Did the new arsenic-removal treatment make the water more corrosive? Or... did the earlier elevated copper results indicate pre-existing corrosivity?
• Lead testing of Durham, NC, schools completed; most given green light; positive fountains removed from service (Durham Herald-Sun, September 2)
• USEPA's guidelines on lead for schools and childcare facilities: 3Ts - Training, Testing and Telling (PDF file, 14.7 MB)

Source Water Protection

• AWWA's comments on EPA CAFO rule ask for more consideration on pathogens (AWWA Government Affairs, first item)
• Sewering of Arizona city beside the Colorado River expected to reduce pollution risk for downstream Arizona and California users (Arizona Republic, September 4)
• Lawrence (Kansas) Journal-World series "Out of the Tap" on water quality issues in the local watershed
  • How clean is the water in Lawrence?
  • Limiting growth leaves some dry
  • Herbicide can get into drinking water
  • Farmer's friend also enemy to Clinton Lake
  • Bottle or tap? Depends on taste
• Alabama county commissioner seeks moratorium on septic tanks (Huntsville Times, September 2)

MTBE

• MTBE in Maryland school's wells increases dramatically; bottled water in use (Baltimore Sun, August 31)

NEWS CONTINUES BELOW

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Aesthetics

• Canadians using Lake Ontario and Lake Erie face seasonal musty taste and odor problem (Ancaster News, September 1); Hamilton, Ontario, provides detailed info on the taste and odor issue

Fluoride

• Proposal to stop 50-year-old fluoridation of drinking water in Arcata, CA, is opposed by health professionals (Eureka Reporter, September 5)
  Commentary: Another disingenuous proposed local ordinance-by-referendum which avoids mentioning its target, fluoridation. Instead, it proposes that anything added to drinking water must be approved by FDA, which (thankfully) is not in that business. It also features the usual misleading gambit of having a "yes" vote that means "no"!

Radium

• Illinois village's newly drilled well produces like crazy, but the radium level is still above MCL; what now? (Peoria Journal Star, September 5)

Water Reuse

• August 2006 edition of ReWater: Recycled water for horticulture
• Australian contest looks at how to market the drinking of recycled water (ABC Brisbane, September 5), and another take features W.C. Fields on what fish do in water sources (The Australian, September 4)
  Commentary: While the advertising competition was not an official government activity, the entrants were serious and produced some interesting ideas. Although the "anti-ad" concept was the winner, the cow ad makes one give pause.

Private Wells

• Mandatory testing of private wells continues to be controversial in one New York county (Poughkeepsie Journal, September 2)
• Wisconsin university offers free well testing as part of a research project (Fond du Lac Reporter, September 3)
• Virginia county suggests private well owners test for fluoride (Journal of Loudoun County, September 1)

International

• World Health Organization Report on the status of meeting the millennium development goals for drinking water and sanitation
  Commentary: The WHO report reminds us: "Every year, unsafe water, coupled with a lack of basic sanitation, kills at least 1.6 million children under the age of five years – more than eight times the number of people who died in the Asian tsunami of 2004."

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