What do water treatment plants test for

The Water Treatment Plant allows us to: comply with the requirements of our Operating Licence meet increasingly strict Canadian drinking water quality guidelines, virtually eliminate the risk of waterborne disease, reduce levels of disinfection by-products and significantly improve the taste and odour of the drinking water.

Testing We test our water at Shoal Lake , at the Water Treatment Plant raw water inlet and at the Water Treatment Plant treated water outlet once the water has passed through all of the treatment processes. At the Water Treatment Plant treated water sampling point we test for: routine water chemistry taste and odour compounds metals disinfection by-products bacteria pesticides, herbicides, and PCBs Test results are from January 1 to December 31, Last updated: April 15, Was this information helpful?

Yes No. At the same time, population and production increases have increased water use, creating a corresponding rise in wastewater quantity. This increased water use and process wastewater generation requires more efficient removal of by-products and pollutants that allows for effluent discharge within established environmental regulatory limits.

The determination of wastewater quality set forth in environmental permits has been established since the s in a series of laboratory tests focused on four major categories:. Although wastewater analytical tests are often separated into categories, it is important to understand that these tests are not independent of each other Figure 1.

In other words, a contaminant identified by one test in one category can also be identified in another test in a separate category. For example, the organics in a wastewater sample represented by BOD will also be represented in the spectrum of solids, either as suspended TSS or dissolved TDS particulates.

For most people a complete understanding of the standard methods required to accurately complete critical wastewater analytical tests is not necessary. However, a fundamental understanding of the theory behind and working knowledge of the basic procedures used for each test, and the answers to commonly asked questions about each test can be a valuable tool for anyone involved in generating, monitoring, treating or discharging process wastewater.

Today there are four common laboratory tests used to determine the gross amount of organic matter i. Wastewater generated by commercial, industrial and institutional facilities is typically referred to as "high-strength" compared to typical household wastewater.

This table can be used to understand how non-sanitary process wastewater compares to typical domestic wastewater. The answer is serial dilution — a procedure that allows for the stepwise reduction in concentration usually fold of full strength wastewater in DI deionized water, as illustrated in Figure 2 below. After dilution, the resulting difference between the initial and final DO reading simply has to be multiplied by the dilution factor to determine the final BOD result.

For example: 1. The goal of the wastewater treatment is to reduce the BOD value in wastewater. COD is a measure of total oxygen used to break down both biologically-used organic matter indicated by BOD and inert organic matter.

Because BOD measures oxygen in a biological process that may take 5 days, it is a much slower measuring process compared to COD, which can only take a few hours. Wastewater from agriculture, animal feeding, storm water runoff and municipal facilities may all contribute to the blame of algal blooming due to excess amount of nutrients in surface water.

The overgrowth of algae using excess amounts of nitrogen from ammonia, nitrite, nitrate and organic nitrogen and phosphorus in surface water causes production of neutoxins microcystins that may contaminate future drinking water and threaten human health.

The algae further eaten up by bacteria use up the dissolved oxygen in surface water and lead to death of aquatic animals.

To protect the public health, a nitrogen and phosphate test requirement has been added to some of the NPDES permits and a variety of methods can be used for nutrient analysis. The colorimetric analysis and automated photometric assays are fast and cost-effective for total nitrogen and total phosphate tests.

In addition, the recently developed ion chromatography method to analyze total nitrogen and total phosphorus in a single chromatography run after a single digestion is also effective. The major source of heavy metal contamination is industrial wastewater from textile, paper and pulping, semi-conductor, metal finishing and plating, and many other industrial categories. Besides the notorious top 4 heavy metals , other metals, such as chromium, nickel, and zinc see table above are also toxic to human health.

Analytical methods for wastewater heavy metals are based on EPA methods Last, but not least, are organic contaminants and emerging contaminants.

Many different kinds of organic contaminants including pesticides in wastewater are regulated in NPDES permits. Emerging contaminants , such as pharmaceutical and personal care products PPCPs , hormones, and endocrine disrupters, have recently caused public health concerns. Many of them are still in the study stage and their exact health effects are still not clear. Although they are not currently regulated by government authorities, many analytical methods to analyze emerging contaminants with targeted and untargeted approaches are under development.

High resolution mass spectrometry HRMS coupled with liquid or gas chromatography is a powerful tool for determination of this dangerous class of contaminants. Access this Toolkit to learn from application and industry experts about workflows and innovations that you can implement to advance your environmental water testing. In homes, this includes water from sinks, showers, bathtubs, toilets, washing machines and dishwashers.

Businesses and industries also contribute their share of used water that must be cleaned. We consider wastewater treatment as a water use because it is so interconnected with the other uses of water.

Much of the water used by homes, industries, and businesses must be treated before it is released back to the environment. If the term "wastewater treatment" is confusing to you, you might think of it as "sewage treatment. Treatment plants reduce pollutants in wastewater to a level nature can handle. Wastewater also includes storm runoff. Although some people assume that the rain that runs down the street during a storm is fairly clean, it isn't. Harmful substances that wash off roads, parking lots , and rooftops can harm our rivers and lakes.

It's a matter of caring for our environment and for our own health. There are a lot of good reasons why keeping our water clean is an important priority:. This is important to the fishing industry, sport fishing enthusiasts, and future generations. They are critical habitats for hundreds of species of fish and other aquatic life. Migratory water birds use the areas for resting and feeding.