What Causes Water Quality To Deteriorate?

Good water quality can be elusive. Many factors are at work that make the trail of success a difficult one. Detours come in such diverse forms as the grounding of electric supplies to the water system, the material composition of the pipe within the distribution network, the corrosion of pipes, cross connections, and the presence of organic contaminants. A discussion of these problems took place among several of the trustees of the AWWA Water Quality Division at the fifth annual Water Quality Technology Conference held in Louisville, Ky. Paul A. Schulte, deputy executive director of AWWA, moderated the discussion. The participants included John E. Courchene, director, water quality, Seattle Water Department; Joseph E. Downey, director, Alabama Department of Water Supplies; Alan F. Hess, project manager, Malcolm Pirnie, Oakland, N.J., office; Harold E. Pearson, water quality engineer and consultant, Pomona, Calif.; Edward Singley, professor of water chemistry, department of environmental engineering sciences, University of Florida at Gainesville, and chairman of the Water Quality Division; and James M. Symons, chief, physical and chemical contaminants branch, municipal environmental research laboratory, office of research and development, USEPA, Cincinnati, Ohio.