Environmental Engineering Reference
In-Depth Information
10
Drinking W
ater Monitoring
It is not enough that you should understand about applied science in
order that your work may increase man's blessings. Concern for the man
himself and his fate must always form the chief interest of all technical
endeavors; concern for the great unsolved problems of the organization
of labor and the distribution of goods in order that the creations of our
mind shall be a blessing and not a curse to mankind. Never forget this in
the midst of your diagrams and equations.
—Albert Einstein (From a speech given at California
Institute of Technology, 1931)
An estimated 1.1 billion people worldwide lack clean drinking water and
2.4 billion lack access to basic sanitation. Targets adopted by the United
Nations in September 2000 aim to halve these
figures by 2015, but projec-
tions suggest those goals, which would require more than 100,000 people
every day to be connected to clean water supplies, will not be met.
—Patricia Brett (2005)
Introduction
When we speak of drinking water monitoring, we refer to water quality
monitoring based on three criteria:
1. Ensure to the greatest extent possible that the water is not a danger
to public health.
2. Ensure that the water provided at the tap is as aesthetically pleasing
as possible.
3. Ensure compliance with applicable regulations.
To meet these goals, all public water systems must monitor water quality to
some extent. Before the Ground Water Rule of 2006 was implemented, the
degree of monitoring employed was dependent on local needs, requirements,
and the type of water system. Small water systems using good-quality water
from deep wells may only have to provide occasional monitoring, but sys-
tems using surface water sources must test water quality frequently (AWWA,
1995). The Ground Water Rule of 2006 modified sampling and monitoring
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