AWWA ACE94041

The Philadelphia Water Department (PWD), like many drinking water utilities, will look back at the 1990s as the decade of change. The Disinfectant/Disinfection By-Products Rule, the Enhanced Surface Water Treatment Rule, the Total Coliform Rule and the Lead and Copper Rule are all requiring a re-examination of the management practices in use at a water utility and how and what one considers an acceptable product. The new rules will call for more changes, more monitoring and more customer education/interaction. Yet recent episodes have shown that drinking water outbreaks will occur despite compliance with the standards set through regulation. Multiple barriers developed over decades of treatment experience are now being questioned for their adequacy. In fact, the rules reduce flexibility in treatment, requiring more specialized and finely operated processes. This makes treatment more susceptible to failure - failure as defined by regulatory requirements rather than risks to public safety. This paper centers on the proposed regulations and their impact on providing high quality drinking water. This is an important issue since it is daily operations that protect the public health while national regulations serve to improve a baseline quality.

Product Details

Published:

01/01/1994

ISBN(s):

0898677726

Number of Pages:

13

File Size:

1 file , 510 KB