Consider the Source: A Pocket Guide to Protecting Your Drinking Water

This downloadable guide describes the state of the drinking water supply in the United States and what is being done to protect it. The theme is ensuring safe drinking water through the multiple-barrier approach, which includes risk prevention, risk management, risk monitoring and compliance, and individual action barriers. The Safe Drinking Water Act (SDWA) amendments of 1996 outline six steps for prevention programs to protect and benefit public drinking water systems. Together, they form the basis of comprehensive drinking water source protection and are discussed in detail along with the tools for implementing them. The remainder of the book is devoted to the source water assessment and protection plans (SWAP) and the best management practices (BMPs) for them. Educational levels: Middle school, High school, Undergraduate lower division, Undergraduate upper division, Graduate or professional

A proposed framework for managing environmental causes and consequences of ocean traffic and ports

Paper presented at European Decision Sciences Institute (ED2016), 7th Annual Conference, 24th to 27th May 2016, Helsinki. Abstract The cumulative and in-combination effects of ocean shipping and port operations need addressing via a detailed, rigorous and holistic framework of risk assessment and risk management. This aims to protect the natural system while at the same time obtaining societal benefits from the seas. This paper proposes a conceptual framework that integrates both an ISO industry standard risk assessment and management framework (Bow-tie analysis) and the DAPSI(W)R(M) analysis supported by the ten-tenets criteria to provide guidance for all stakeholders, including industry and government, to address these issues. Water pollution stemming from maritime logistics and SCM are used to illustrate this framework

A Study for the Necessity of Risk Assessment for Heavy metal Pollution in the Barada Basin, Syria

Manufacturing industries are blooming rapidly in Barada Basin carrying high risk to environment and human health due to generating huge amounts of heavy metals to environmental media, particularly rivers. Few studies show that concentrations of chromium, cadmium, and lead exceed the standards in down streams of rivers. Risk assessment on human health urges for immediate measures to control the emission of these metals. In this paper, we discuss the implementation of comprehensive risk management policy as an element to introduce an optimal policy to reduce water pollution and improve water quality in the Barada Basin.

Health-based risk targets for fluorosis in tribal children of rural Madhya Pradesh, India

Conventional approaches to fluorosis mitigation and control are based on reduction of excess fluoride consumption from water. Country specific standard limits of 1 mg/l or 1.5mg/l are established and monitored by water departments based on recommendations outlined in the World Health Organization (WHO) Guidelines for Drinking Water Quality (GDWQ). With the advent of the third edition of the WHO GDWQ there is a fundamental departure from standard setting, based on doseresponse affect, towards risk assessment and risk management. The water quality framework, outlined in the guidelines, consists of an iterative cycle, comprising: an assessment of risk, health targets linked to the wider public health context; risk management (with these components being informed by aspects of environmental exposure and acceptable risk) The guidelines advocate for the use of Water Safety Plans, as risk management tool, to help achieve Health Based Risk Targets. This paper presents the application of a Quantitative Chemical Risk Assessment (QCRA) method for determining health based risk targets for fluorosis control. The paper presents evidence from Madhya Pradesh, India. The findings indicate firstly that to control fluorosis total daily consumption from all exposure routes (water and food) must be considered, secondly that the most exposed population group to fluorosis are children due to lack of alternative early nutrients (e.g. exclusive breastfeeding) and, thirdly, that quantifying chemical risk is essential for appropriate risk management strategies to reduce fluorosis in children

Calculating risk change with management actions using Bayesian networks for the South River, Virginia, USA

Ecological managers often implement one or more management options to manage risk without the direct integration of a quantitative risk assessment and evaluation of management alternatives. Throughout the decision making process a manager should consider multiple stressors as well as stressor interactions and the resulting effects. In my study, I used Bayesian networks in a relative risk assessment model framework (BN-RRM) to integrate two management options into existing risk assessment models for biotic endpoints and water quality endpoints in the mercury contaminated site, South River, VA. The two management options assessed were agricultural best management practices (BMPs) and bank stabilization. The primary management goal expressed by managers is no regrets. In other words, managers do not want to make the site worse in any way, such as reducing mercury levels at the detriment of habitat, loss of other species, degradation of water quality, or other environmental parameters. The Bayesian networks represent the expected effects of a management option and the potential for unintended consequences. Agricultural BMPs did not change the skew of the risk distributions, but aligns with the no regrets management focus because risk did not increase. Bank stabilization management shifted the risk distribution for smallmouth bass so that there was greater likelihood of zero risk. The risk distribution for the water quality-fishing endpoint changed because likelihood of medium and high risk increased. If bank stabilization is implemented without consideration of Belted Kingfisher nests, there was 100% likelihood of high risk to the Kingfisher. My research provides South River managers with a tool that describes how management options are expected to change risk to biotic and water quality endpoints. Adaptive management for the South River is a long-term process. The BN-RRM models can be updated with new monitoring data to inform future management decisions

Climate change adaptation, flood risks and policy coherence in integrated water resources management in England

Integrated water resources management (IWRM) assumes coherence between cognate aspects of water governance at the river basin scale, for example water quality, energy production and agriculture objectives. But critics argue that IWRM is often less ‘integrated’ in practice, raising concerns over inter-sectoral coherence between implementing institutions. One increasingly significant aspect of IWRM is adaptation to climate change-related risks, including threats from flooding, which are particularly salient in England. Although multiple institutional mechanisms exist for flood risk management (FRM), their coherence remains a critical question for national adaptation. This paper therefore (1) maps the multi-level institutional frameworks determining both IWRM and FRM in England; (2) examines their interaction via various inter-institutional coordinating mechanisms; and (3) assesses the degree of coherence. The analysis suggests that cognate EU strategic objectives for flood risk assessment demonstrate relatively high vertical and horizontal coherence with river basin planning. However, there is less coherence with flood risk requirements for land-use planning and national flood protection objectives. Overall, this complex governance arrangement actually demonstrates de-coherence over time due to ongoing institutional fragmentation. Recommendations for increasing IWRM coherence in England or re-coherence based on greater spatial planning and coordination of water-use and land-use strategies are proposed

Water Scarcity in the Zambezi Basin in the Long-Term Future: A Risk Assessment

The aim of this paper is to explore possible futures for the Zambezi basin and to estimate the risks of different water management strategies. Existing uncertainties are translated into alternative assumptions. The risk of a certain management strategy, which has been developed under a given set of assumptions, is analysed by applying alternative assumptions. For the exploration of possible futures, a dynamic simulation model is used. Three ‘utopias’ and a number of ‘dystopias’ are considered. A utopia is based on a coherent set of assumptions with respect to world-view (how does the world function), management style (how do people respond) and context (exogenous developments). A dystopia evolves if some assumptions are taken differently. Using the risk assessment method described, the paper reflects on the water policy priorities earlier proposed in an expert meeting held in Harare. It is shown that in only one out of the nine cases putting the ‘Harare priorities’ into practice will work out effectively and without large tradeoffs. It is concluded that minimising risks would require a radical shift from supply towards demand policy.\u

Water safety plans : methodologies for risk assessment and risk management in drinking-water systems

Providing good and safe drinking-water is world-wide considered to be a fundamental political issue for public health protection, and must be the primary objective of water supply systems. Drinking-water quality control has currently been based on detection of pathogens and toxic concentrations of chemicals by means of monitoring programs and compliance with national or international guidelines and standards, relying mainly on indicator bacteria and chemicals maximum concentration levels. However, this methodology is often slow, complex and costly. Even for sophisticated and well-operated systems these monitoring schemes have proved to be inefficient in preventing waterborne diseases like, for instance, Giardia or Cryptosporidium outbreaks. From this evidence we can conclude that end-product testing is a reactive rather than preventive way to demonstrate confidence in good and safe drinking-water. This justifies the need for the formulation of a new approach in drinking-water quality control based on understanding of system vulnerability for contamination and on preventive means and actions necessary to guarantee the safety of the water supplied to the consumer. Water safety plan is a concept for risk assessment and risk management throughout the water cycle from the catchments to the point of consumption. This approach includes the identification of the hazards and introduction of control points that serve to minimize these potential hazards, providing for more effective control of drinking-water quality. This paper presents an overview of the first two years experience in developing and implementing a water safety plan in a Portuguese multimunicipal water company. Since key personnel had contributed to the assessment of hazards and evaluation of corrective actions for control points, a greater understanding of water quality control and improvements on technical operation and performance have been registered, demonstrating good value for the methodology

Assessing reservoir operations risk under climate change

Risk-based planning offers a robust way to identify strategies that permit adaptive water resources management under climate change. This paper presents a flexible methodology for conducting climate change risk assessments involving reservoir operations. Decision makers can apply this methodology to their systems by selecting future periods and risk metrics relevant to their planning questions and by collectively evaluating system impacts relative to an ensemble of climate projection scenarios (weighted or not). This paper shows multiple applications of this methodology in a case study involving California\u27s Central Valley Project and State Water Project systems. Multiple applications were conducted to show how choices made in conducting the risk assessment, choices known as analytical design decisions, can affect assessed risk. Specifically, risk was reanalyzed for every choice combination of two design decisions: (1) whether to assume climate change will influence flood-control constraints on water supply operations (and how), and (2) whether to weight climate change scenarios (and how). Results show that assessed risk would motivate different planning pathways depending on decision-maker attitudes toward risk (e.g., risk neutral versus risk averse). Results also show that assessed risk at a given risk attitude is sensitive to the analytical design choices listed above, with the choice of whether to adjust flood-control rules under climate change having considerably more influence than the choice on whether to weight climate scenarios

Improving risk assessment and management in urban water supplies

The current approach to management of microbial risks in distribution systems places a high reliance on the results of testing indicator bacteria. There is evidence of the fundamental weaknesses of sole reliance on such approaches as the number of samples taken represent a minute proportion of the water supplied and studies have demonstrated that this approach results in limited protection of consumer health (Payment, 1991)