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With the threat of terrorist action on our nation's water systems looming, the Erie CountyWater Authority (ECWA) began to evaluate ways of enhancing its water quality surveillanceefforts. The ECWA began to formalize the structure of its water quality surveillanceprogram using its existing capabilities. As a part of this enhancement process, itsDepartment of Water Quality began to look toward the use of the Water Authority'sexisting geographic information system (GIS) to optimize the water quality surveillance program and increaseawareness and response to potential water quality issues.A full-scale water quality surveillance program was developed to monitor the drinkingwater for the population of just over 500,000 people that it serves in Western New YorkState. The use of non-conventional testing and monitoring methodologies such asMicrotox and TOC screening became daily water system monitoring tools. Bacteriallevels in the water were scrutinized more than normal, and any questionable toxicityresults were followed by in-house GC/MS library searches for possible contaminants.With the Water Quality Surveillance Program in place, the Erie County Water Authoritylooked to develop ways to enhance the current sampling and testing program. The firststep was to realize the current potential of the GIS system. Sample locations were loadedonto the GIS, based upon their physical locations. This provided an initial means ofevaluating the placement of sampling locations in the system while also being able toaccess crucial information such as the size of the water lines, valves or hydrants in closeproximity to the sampling sites. Daily sample routes are now developed based upon thelocations selected to reflect coverage of the entire water system. The current samplingprogram provides for sampling daily, including weekends and holidays and allows forcoliform, SPC, TOC, and Microtox analysis. In the event of a problem in thedistribution system the GIS permits a geographical evaluation of all sample sites servedby both treatment plants. It allows the user to evaluate a site to determine if a waterquality problem is site specific or not and whether it will affect the rest of the distributionsystem. It also provides an easy manner for detecting those sampling sites closest to theeffected area or site within the system. In the event of a major water quality problem, theGIS system allows for a geographic evaluation of the affected area and its infrastructurecharacteristics, as well as providing a means for the rapid determination of sample siteswithin a given circumference of the problem site. Under normal sampling and monitoringconditions, the most efficient routes can be planned by the GIS, but in the event of anemergency the GIS can also be used to determine which sampling vehicle in the fleet isclosest to the affected site through the use of the Automatic Vehicle Locator (AVL). Thisprovides for rapid re-evaluation of the sample site.

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Edition: Vol. - No. Published: 11/02/2003 Number of Pages: 3File Size: 1 file , 210 KB