 Most of us take clean drinking water for granted. No one hesitates before drinking at a school water fountain or from a glass of water served at a restaurant. When we look at the wide blue lake or the fast flowing river that provides drinking water for the community, we wonder how anyone can say the water is not pure. Looks can be deceiving. The truth is that few streams, rivers or lakes in the United States can be called pure. In fact, water is often called the universal solvent. It can dissolve almost any chemical, whether natural or man-made, on contact and become contaminated with it. Therefore, before any water can be called safe for people to drink, it must be tested and usually treated. Drinking water cannot be taken for granted. It takes time, money and knowledge to bring safe drinking water to the faucet. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency or EPA, which oversees public drinking water supplies across the country, wants to make sure that all public water suppliers know what regulations they must follow. You may not consider yourself or your facility a public water supplier, but if you provide piped water from your own well, nearby lake or stream, and you serve 25 or more of the same people for six months per year, you are what EPA calls a non-transient, non-community water supplier. Your system is called non-transient because the same people use the water most of the year, and non-community because you serve a non-residential population and are not connected to another public water system. Typically, non-transient, non-community systems include schools and daycare centers, factories, institutions or any business having 25 or more students or workers. Usually, these systems are in areas not served by a central public water supply. Non-transient, non-community water systems are subject to many new regulations. These requirements are enforced primarily by your state's drinking water program. There are four components to the regulations under the Safe Drinking Water Act. They are standards, monitoring, reporting and record keeping, and public notification. All public water systems must ensure that their water meets contaminant-specific standards established by EPA or the state government. EPA arrives at an enforceable standard for each contaminant. However, some states may have stricter standards than the federal ones. The EPA standard is known as a Maximum Contaminant Level, or MCL. Your drinking water must not contain contaminants above these levels. An MCL is based on potential or actual human health effects posed by the contaminant, the state of the current technology for treating the water for that contaminant, and the costs of that treatment. How does drinking water become contaminated in the first place? Drinking water is drawn from either groundwater or surface water supplies. Groundwater is water that is found beneath the earth's surface in rocks and subsoils. Surface water, such as lakes, rivers and streams, is open to the air and runoff, and therefore is more likely to become contaminated. Some groundwater may be influenced by surface water, if it is a shallow well or a spring. Groundwater that comes in contact with surface water is often contaminated by the same contaminants found in the surface water. Your state drinking water program has already classified each water source as groundwater or surface water. The state will further classify some sources as groundwater influenced by surface water by June 29, 1999. Call your state drinking water program to classify your water source. This information is important because the use of monitoring and treatment required under the Safe Drinking Water Act depends on the type of water source. The categories of contaminants that are regulated under the Safe Drinking Water Act include microorganisms, inorganic contaminants, synthetic organics, volatile organics, radionuclides, and disinfection byproducts. Microorganisms are living organisms and include bacteria, viruses, protozoa, and fungi. Public water systems must report the presence or absence of total coliforms in the water. The presence of coliforms, a class of bacteria, serves as an indicator of more serious disease-causing microorganisms. Although microbial contamination occurs most often in surface water, it can also occur in groundwater. Microorganisms, especially those that come from human or animal waste, can cause serious diseases such as cholera or hepatitis. The more common illnesses from contaminated water involve cramps and diarrhea. Another problem, turbidity, is cloudiness in the water caused by solids suspended in it. In the regulations, turbidity is included as a microbial contaminant because turbidity may hide the presence of microorganisms and may interfere with disinfection. Most microorganisms and turbidity can be removed or inactivated with two treatment techniques. The first treatment method is filtration which removes turbidity and microorganisms. All surface water systems and groundwater under the influence of surface water must filter unless they meet certain criteria. The second method is disinfection which involves adding a chemical, usually chlorine, to the water to inactivate or kill any microorganisms present. Disinfection is required for all systems using surface water or groundwater influenced by surface water. In the future, new regulations may require disinfection for groundwater systems as well. Inorganic contaminants include metals such as lead, chromium, barium, cadmium and mercury. Inorganic contaminants get into our water sources as a result of industrial, agricultural and natural activities. Health effects from inorganic contaminants can either be acute, occurring immediately or chronic, occurring over a long time. The most common acute effect is intestinal upset. Chronic effects include liver and kidney problems as well as nervous system disorders. Nitrites and nitrates are inorganic components of agricultural fertilizers and sewage and are common contaminants in drinking water sources. Both have been found to cause blue baby syndrome, a condition in newborn babies in which the blood is unable to carry oxygen efficiently. Two more inorganic contaminants of concern are lead and copper. They usually enter drinking water after treatment because they are components of many plumbing materials. Copper can cause stomach and intestinal problems. Excessive lead exposure alters physical and mental development and causes hearing problems and impaired blood synthesis. Lead especially affects young children. Since lead was removed from most gasoline, drinking water is one of the largest sources of lead exposure after paint and dust. Synthetic organics are chemicals that are man-made such as pesticides and solvents. Pesticides can be carried from fields into water sources by runoff or improper disposal. Many pesticides can cause chronic health problems such as cancer and can damage the nervous system and vital organs. Volatile organic chemicals, usually referred to as VOCs, are characterized by their tendency to evaporate easily. Many are industrial solvents. They include benzene and trichloroethylene or TCE, a component of many industrial solvents and dry cleaning fluids. These chemicals enter drinking water sources if they are improperly used or disposed of. Some VOCs cause cancer. Others cause nervous system disorders or affect the liver and kidney. Radionuclides are naturally occurring radioactive materials that enter drinking water sources usually as a natural phenomenon. Radon and radium are two examples. If consumed in drinking water, both may cause cancer over long periods of time. Disinfection byproducts are formed when the chlorine used for disinfection reacts with naturally occurring contaminants in the water. They are a growing concern for public health officials. One byproduct, chloroform, may cause cancer. Although non-transient non-community water systems currently are not required to test for disinfection byproducts, future rules may require smaller systems to monitor for them. Monitoring is the second major component of the drinking water program. The regulations require monitoring schedules for the different groups of contaminants we have discussed. States may set more stringent schedules than the federal standards if they wish. To stay in compliance with both federal and state regulations, your facility must monitor according to regulatory schedules. Send samples to a certified lab for analysis. Report results from tests on water samples to your state. And show results equal to or lower than the maximum contaminant level. Monitoring schedules vary with the category of contaminant. Sampling procedures are also contaminant-specific. Your state or regional EPA drinking water office can provide information about the specific monitoring schedules for each class of chemical. While the requirements under the Safe Drinking Water Act may sound complex, the individual steps are straightforward. Let's look at the Country Day School, a small, non-transient non-community water system as a case study. The Country Day School obtains its water from a well on school property. The school employs six teachers and has 42 students. The state has notified the school principal, Ellen Chancellor, of the public water system requirements. Realizing her responsibility to her students and teachers, Ellen has decided to start right away on complying with the new rules. Her first step is to determine which contaminants her school must test for. Referring to materials she obtained from the state about the Safe Drinking Water Act requirements, she found that non-transient non-community water systems with groundwater sources not influenced by surface water are required to collect four quarterly samples for volatile organic chemical determinations, collect a sample for total coliforms each quarter that school is in session, collect one sample per year to test for inorganics, and sample every six months for lead. Not all groundwater systems are required to test for pesticides. However, since the school is in an agricultural area, the State Drinking Water Division recommended that the school conduct a test for pesticides quarterly for one year. Next, Ellen called the State Drinking Water Division to get a list of laboratories certified to perform drinking water testing. Hello, this is Ellen Chancellor, principal of the Country Day School, and I just received a notice. Certified laboratories have demonstrated their capability to conduct the required tests using the procedures and documentation specified by EPA. In some states, the State Drinking Water Program may take the samples and perform the analysis. Once Ellen had chosen a laboratory, the laboratory manager provided instructions on how to take samples throughout the school. For the more complex sampling procedures, a technician would travel to the school to take samples. Ellen referred again to the materials from the State Drinking Water Division to establish a schedule and map out the sampling locations. She and the school nurse collected samples from all five of the taps in the school for lead and from one tap for total coliforms following the laboratory's instructions. A laboratory technician collected samples from one tap for volatile and synthetic organic chemicals, as well as inorganic contaminants. With proper instruction and sampling bottles from a laboratory, you can do all the sampling yourself. A few weeks later, the sample results were on Ellen's desk. The laboratory manager included a cover letter asking her to call to discuss the results. Comparing the test results to EPA's MCLs for the contaminants tested, she found that the facility's water exceeded the maximum contaminant level for trichloroethylene or TCE, an industrial solvent sometimes found in drinking water. Because a contaminant was found at a level exceeding the MCL, Ellen was required to report the exceedance to the state within 48 hours. She then contacted a water treatment specialist to advise her on how to remedy the problem. The school was presented with three options. One, to drill a new well to a deeper uncontaminated groundwater source. Two, to hook up to a larger water supplier. Or finally, to treat the water to eliminate the TCE. The specialist recommended that the fastest and most economical option would be to treat the water. So the specialist installed an air stripper. Air stripping capitalizes on a volatile organic chemicals tendency to evaporate easily, drawing it from the water as a vapor. However, until the water is treated, a safe source of drinking water should be supplied. To comply with the regulations, all public water systems must provide copies of all test results to the state within the first 10 days of the month following sampling. They also must keep some results on file for up to 10 years. I just wanted to give you an update on the drinking water situation. Communicating with the people who use the water at a facility is one of the most important aspects of a system operator's job. When the contamination was found at the country day school, it was Ellen's responsibility to make sure all the users, in this case teachers, children, and their parents were notified. In a non-transient, non-community system, the procedure is straightforward. Post notices in conspicuous places around the facility for as long as the standard is exceeded. The notice must include language provided by EPA, describing the health effects of the contaminant. In this case, being prudent, Ellen also sent a note home to all parents, even though it's not required. EPA and your state drinking water program are responsible for making sure all aspects of the requirements, standards, monitoring, reporting and record keeping, and public notification are addressed. In some cases, these responsibilities have been delegated to local or county governments. If you do not comply with these regulations, you could face legal action and penalties from your state or EPA. The more important reason to comply with the regulations, however, is to protect the health of the people at your facility, as well as your own health. The EPA's Safe Drinking Water Act, you, your state, and the Environmental Protection Agency have a common goal, to provide safe, clean drinking water for everyone. By following the steps spelled out in EPA's regulations, you can be sure that you are doing your part. This way, we can all keep clean, safe drinking water on tap for the future. For more information, contact EPA's Safe Drinking Water Hotline at 1-800-426-4791, 8.30 a.m. to 5.00 p.m. Monday through Friday, or call your state's drinking water program or your local government.