COLLEGE PARK, MD, September 13, 2007 — The University of Maryland, which recently replaced its bottled water offerings with triple-filtered tap water in its campus dining rooms, is using a Cathy comic strip to encourage students to break their bottled water habit.

Students have free access to the filtered-water stations. While there, they’ll find a copy of Cathy Guisewite’s August 19 comic strip posted with permission.

In the comic strip, Cathy is reading a health-oriented magazine, enjoying her beverage of “zero calories”: water. As she reads recently published statistics on the environmental costs of bottled water, she experiences “water guilt” and exclaims, “I want tap water.”

Joe Mullineaux, associate director of dining services at the university, said the comic strip is the perfect visual aid to accompany the university’s efforts toward green dining.

CHULA VISTA, CA, September 5, 2007 (Water Tech) — Mistakes made by an Otay Water District inspector and others are highlighted in a district report concerning an Eastlake-area business park that for two years received treated sewage water through pipes intended for potable water only, according to a September 5 article in The San Diego Union-Tribune.

For two years, 17 businesses in the Fenton Business Center unknowingly were drinking and using treated sewage water. It was after the business park’s property manager took a sample of the water to an independent lab that the error became known. The sample showed the presence of total coliform bacteria.

The district’s report, presented to the Otay board on September 5, concludes that Otay inspectors did not follow regulations or missed signs that pipes weren’t properly connected during construction of the Fenton Business Center.

It also reports that the engineer on the project, Irvine, CA-based Hunsaker and Associates, submitted “inaccurate, incomplete and confusing” construction plans to the district but submitted more complete plans to the city that showed the recycled water pipes, the article said.

The report says that William Cooper, one of the water district inspectors working on the project should have noted the inconsistency in his inspection records and asked to see plan revisions. Cooper resigned in August 2004 after he was charged with accepting one bribe and soliciting another on Chula Vista residential projects, according to the article.

DEXTER, MI, September 6, 2007 (Water Tech) — Too much copper was found in the tap water at a local high school here, and while point-of-entry treatment efforts are helping to lower the levels, they’re still not within federal limits, according to a September 5 article in The Ann Arbor News.

The most recent test results show the level of copper has dropped considerably since it was first detected in July, but it still is above the federal standard of 1.3 parts per million (ppm) at 1.9 ppm in some drinking fountains, the article said.

Assistant Superintendent for Dexter Community Schools Mary Marshall said in the article that the copper leaches into the water through the action of bacteria in the system’s water softeners.

Although the district thought it had solved the problem over the summer by installing a chlorine dioxide system, it did not completely resolve the issue, Marshall said in the article.

The district also replaced the resin in the water softeners, Marshall said, because the bacteria that are causing the problem may have accumulated in the old resin.

Multi-Pure Commentary:

Multi-Pure’s MP750 Plus RO has been certified by NSF International, under Standard 58, to reduce Copper.

CORPUS CHRISTI, TX, September 7, 2007 (Water Tech) — Water here will have a chlorine taste and smell for another month as officials await the delivery of equipment that will better monitor water quality.

According to a September 7 Caller-Times story, the city started using straight chlorine as a disinfectant on August 6 after the water had low disinfectant levels.

Low disinfectant levels put the city on a boil-water order between July 20 and July 26 and again between August 14 and August 16. The boil-water order in August was issued after samples tested positive for E. coli.

Officials thought the switch to straight chlorine disinfectant would last between 30 and 45 days, but now say it could last as long as into October.

The city’s Engineering Director Angel Escobar said in the story, “Now that we’ve had that time, we want to make sure we don’t overlook anything.”

Officials say the $198,000 equipment ordered will better monitor ammonia which may be the reason the disinfectant levels were so during the summer months.

LAS VEGAS, NV, September 8, 2007 (Las Vegas Review Journal) — At least seven Clark County residents have been diagnosed in recent weeks with a parasitic illness that causes diarrhea, according to the Southern Nevada Health District.

The cases are enough to issue a wanting of a possible outbreak of cryptosporidiosis, also known as crypto, health officials said.

The waterborne illness isn’t considered deadly and there is no known drug to treat it. However, health care providers can treat symptoms of crypto, which also include dehydration, fever, abdominal pain, and weight loss.

Since Aug. 1, outbreaks have been reported in Colorado, Idaho, Iowa and Utah, health officials say.

Cryptosporidiosis, a parasite, is passed in the stool of infected people and animals.

People get the diarrheal illness when they swallow the parasites often found in poorly cooked food and water.

The parasite is also spread person to person when an individual swallows recreational water containing the parasite such as in swimming pools, hot tubs, rivers, lakes, springs, and ponds.

Symptoms usually appear one to 12 days after exposure and can last up to three weeks.

Resident are being urged to practice good hygiene such as by washing hands with soap and water after using the toilet and before and after handling or eating food.

Multi-Pure Commentary:

Multi-Pure’s Drinking Water Systems have been certified by NSF International, under Standard 53, to reduce Cyst (Crypto).

RIALTO, CA, September 12, 2007 — This city is looking to the state for $23 million to help keep perchlorate from continuing to contaminate the drinking water, a problem that the city has been dealing with for years.

The city is considering declaring the situation, in which perchlorate from former military rocket, fireworks and other explosive manufacturing facilities contaminated the groundwater, a “state of emergency.” This qualification means the city could apply for emergency funding, a September 12 Daily Bulletin story said.

Councilman Ed Scott said in the story, “It’s the only way we can get emergency funds from the governor. We have to do it.”

On August 29, city council members met with state officials, including Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger’s Deputy Chief of Staff Dan Dunmoyer, who was first to suggest the city consider calling the situation a state of emergency.

The money would go toward stopping the perchlorate from continuing to contaminate the groundwater and would be spent on helping the city to determine the scope of the contamination.

Multi-Pure Commentary:

Multi-Pure’s MP750 Plus RO has been certified by NSF International, under Standard 58, to reduce Perchlorate.

GAMBRILLS, MD, September 13, 2007 — For eight years, Irene Carr drank water contaminated with cadmium and thallium, and now Constellation Energy, an energy supplier, is providing her and her neighbors with a weekly delivery of bottled water, a September 12 story in The Capital reported.

In October 2006, the county Health Department took water samples from 82 wells including Carr’s.

Carr’s well contained cadmium levels three times over the Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) allowable level of 5 parts per billion (ppb), according to the EPA Web site. Tests also showed her well contained thallium two times over the allowed EPA level of 0.5 ppb.

Twenty-two other wells tested had “a cocktail of metals,” according to the The Capital.

According to the story, the health department’s investigation came years after tests by Constellation confirmed the presence of heavy metals.

In 1999, Constellation told the Maryland Department of the Environment (MDE) that fly ash, a coal-burning byproduct which contains arsenic, manganese, nickel, aluminum and sulfate, may be getting into the groundwater.

Multi-Pure Commentary:

Multi-Pure’s MP750 Plus RO has been certified by NSF International, under Standard 58, to reduce Cadmium.

CINCINNATI, September 14, 2007 — A water war pitting wastewater treatment effluent against drinking water is taking place between utilities in Kentucky and Ohio.

Sanitation District No. 1, which treats wastewater and rain overflow for 33 communities in several counties of northern Kentucky, wants to open a new wastewater treatment plant in Alexandria, KY, located near the border of Ohio and the metropolitan area of Cincinnati, according to a September 13 9News report.

The effluent from the new plant will be discharged into the Brush Creek in Alexandria, which is connected to the Ohio River, a source of drinking water used by the Cincinnati Water Works.

The Cincinnati Water Works, which supplies drinking water for several counties in Ohio and one in Kentucky, is objecting to the plant’s opening, citing that potentially hazardous waste could flow into the Ohio River, the article said.

Cincinnati Water Works’ Dan Schleuter said in the report, “We’re concerned very much about contaminants, like bacteria and viruses, pharmaceuticals and chemicals, that disrupt the endocrine system. All of them aren’t good to drink.”

The Sanitation District, which will use ultraviolet light at the plant to disinfect the sewage, has refused a $9 million offer from the Cincinnati Water Works to reroute the plant’s discharge pipes so that the effluent would not enter the Ohio River.

SOUTH LAKE TAHOE, CA, September 14, 2007 — Private wells in a subdivision near Lake Tahoe’s South Shore are contaminated, but the groundwater contamination is localized, according to a September 14 Tahoe Daily Tribune article.

Contamination includes excess levels of tetrachloroethylene (TCE), and methyl tertiary butyl ether (MTBE). Freon and chloroform also were found, but within acceptable levels.

Chuck Curtis, supervising engineer for the Lahontan Regional Water Quality Control Board, said in the article, “We're relieved that the contamination appears to [be] limited to a small area of the Tahoe Meadows subdivision, and only a few residences were affected.”

He also said that some contaminants may have reached Lake Tahoe, but they would not have “any measurable effect.”