NARRAGANSETT – Three days after the Rhode Island Department of Health (RIDOH) issued a boil-water advisory for parts of Narragansett and South Kingstown due to E. coli contamination in the local water supply, Narragansett Town Manager James Manni updated residents on the situation at a regularly scheduled Narragansett Town Council meeting Monday night.
He also said that local businesses had been hit hard by the boil-water advisory over the weekend, and the decision to issue the measure came from RIDOH, not the town.
“The Town of Narragansett did not have any of its own tests come back with any type of result indicating bacteria during that same time period.” The positive test result at Suez’s testing sites a town over, according to Manni, “triggered” the need for a second test to be conducted the next day, on Thursday, Aug. 30.
When the results of that test also displayed positive, Suez notified RIDOH, who in turn notified the towns.
“Again, it was in Narragansett and not in South Kingstown.
On Aug. 14, we had a water test done and the town engineer came to me and said we had a water sample test positive for bacteria growing in it and RIDOH had been notified.
Five of the testing sites contain water that is Suez water.
One of the testing sites is from North Kingstown Water Supply.
“So when we buy water from North Kingstown, and we buy it from Suez, it flows through these booster stations which supply it with chlorine.” Manni said one of his initial questions to RIDOH was, if the water supplied from SUEZ was contaminated with E. coli but then supplied with chlorine on its route to Narragansett customers, why did Narragansett also have to issue its boil-water advisory?
And looking at it in totality, you have to support that decision.” Manni also mentioned a water expert from the RIDOH explained that chlorine injected into the water supply at boosting stations was not enough to eradicate the presence of bacteria completely, but was enough to stop it from growing.

After drinking contaminated water at his farm shed for 40 years Ōhakea farmer Andy Russell wants to know how much toxic substance from firefighting foam is in his blood.
He’s one of at least 13 people who live or work around the Ōhakea Airforce Base who have asked to have their blood tested for the presence of the per or poly fluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) that have been in firefighting foam used at the base.
Russell had his blood test on September 3, and said the results are six weeks away.
"We don’t know what elevated levels in our blood will mean."
He chairs the residents’ group formed in response to news that compounds from the foams have spread 3km from the base in groundwater.
Little was known about PFAS when is was first found at Ōhakea, a NZDF spokesperson said.
More testing found two of the substances, PFOS and PFOA, were above guideline levels.
In September modelling showed contamination could have moved beyond the base, and the NZDF wanted to contact neighbours and test their water.
PFOS and PFOA are no longer approved for use in firefighting foams in New Zealand, an All of Government PFAS spokesperson said.
Other, less damaging, PFAS compounds may be in firefighting foams still in use.

POCATELLO — A grassroots environmental group has renewed a push for new city and Bannock County ordinances protecting groundwater quality because group members are concerned about the presence of certain contaminants in the local aquifer.
Second, levels of chlorinated solvents, once heavily used for dry-cleaning and industrial de-greasing, are on the rise in monitoring wells within the Bannock County Landfill.
The city’s engineering staff completed a conceptual plan in 2013 for connecting sewer lines to the Johnny Creek neighborhood — where aging septic systems have represented a significant source of nitrates reaching groundwater.
“During this year’s budget season, a number of City Council members were very interested in addressing this nitrate concern,” said Hannah Sanger, the city’s science and environment administrator.
“We already have a housing shortage here, and we just want to compound the problem?” Tovey asked.
Tovey believes nitrates in water can mostly be traced back to “legacy” septic systems installed in the 1950s and 1960s, and modern septic tanks pose little problem.
Sue Skinner, a retired local Environmental Protection Agency official who serves as policy adviser to the Portneuf Resource Council, said even most modern septic systems contribute to contamination of groundwater.
In the event that nitrate levels ever exceed allowable standards, Skinner said the technical advisory committee estimated at the time that it would cost $250,000 per year to treat each of the city’s 26 wells.
Through 2012, Thackray gave about 20 presentations to civic organizations, university classes and governmental leaders highlighting the committee’s concerns and suggestions, especially pertaining to hooking up neighborhoods with leaking septic systems to sewer service.
By the following year, several municipal wells in the Portneuf Valley had to be closed because of chlorinated solvent contamination.

A Suez Water employee flushes and tests water from a hydrant in front of the fire station in South Kingstown last week.
[The Providence Journal / Kris Craig] PROVIDENCE, R.I. — After more than a week, some residents in Narragansett and South Kingstown no longer have to boil their tap water before drinking it.
The state health department announced Saturday that it was lifting an advisory to boil water for four water systems — Suez Water, Narragansett-Point Judith, South Kingstown-South Shore and South-Kingstown-Middlebridge — after finding no contamination of E. coli or coliform bacteria for three consecutive days.
Before using their water again, customers should clean and sanitize refrigerators with water dispensers or ice makers, replace water-treatment filter cartridges, and run faucets for 10 minutes if they weren’t used during the advisory.
A boil-water advisory remains in place for customers of the Narragansett-North End water system.
The health department said that water samples from that system collected on Wednesday and Saturday contained coliform bacteria.
Residents affected by the advisory may fill bottles of water at West Kingston Park, at 3840 Kingstown Rd., West Kingston, from 8:30 a.m. to 5 p.m.
Elderly residents and people with disabilities should contact (401) 789-1091 for assistance.
Consumption of contaminated water could result in illness, including the following symptoms: Fever; blood in the stool; prolonged vomiting that prevents keeping liquids down, which can lead to dehydration; diarrhea; and signs of dehydration, including a decrease in urination, a dry mouth and throat, and feeling dizzy when standing up.
The health department is investigating reports of gastrointestinal illness, which would be associated with E. coli infection.

Hyderabad: The Metropolitan Water Board has been losing Rs 324 crore through theft, but has termed the loss as ‘leakage’.
For many years, the board has been claiming that about 40 per cent out of the 450 million gallons a day (MGD) of water supplied to the city every day is lost due to leakage and lack of storage capacity.
Sources said while the water board officials look the other way, several residents have been drawing water illegally from the main pipelines.
The sources said if the water board officials’ claims were true then all 200 MGD that was said to have leaked every day should have increased the groundwater levels in the city.
It is also clear that officials are allowing the siphoning off of water and are manipulating the revenue.
Admitting that 40 per cent of water supply was unaccounted for, a senior official told this newspaper that the board had hired a consultant to study the issue.
He said the consultant had inspected the city’s 130 reservoirs and had stated that only 2 per cent of water leaked from 54 reservoirs.
The official said the water board could earn Rs 13 crore every month if it spent Rs 8 crore on repairing the leakages.
He said it would take eight months and Rs 1,000 crore to minimise water wastage.
The water board, on an average, collects Rs 107 crore as water charges; it could generate another Rs 13 crore revenue per month if the unaccounted for water wastage is checked.

The US Environmental Protection Agency has known for decades it could have a PFAS problem on its hands, and now hundreds of communities across the US are finding the chemicals in their water.
That’s just one case; Department of Defense and Northeastern University data tally 172 known contaminated sites, and those numbers do not account for contaminated public water systems, which the Environmental Working Group estimates could add up to over 1,500 additional sites.
And they are likely contaminating the water supplies of tens of millions of people in the US.
PFAS contamination cases outside the US—particularly in Australia—are also beginning to emerge.
The health risks of PFAS exposure At this point, most people in the US have been exposed to chemicals in the PFAS family.
The compounds leach into the water supply from sites where PFAS industries dumped their manufacturing waste, or where firefighting foam is allowed to seep into the ground.
For example, Sharon Lerner at the Intercept recently reported that 3M, makers of Scotchguard and firefighting foam made from PFOS and PFOA, knew by the 1970s that the compounds were harmful to people’s health and accumulating in people’s blood, and yet continued manufacturing the compounds and withheld the information from the US Environmental Protection Agency until turning over documents and ceasing production in 2000.
Why isn’t the government doing anything about PFAS?
This year, in January, EPA and White House staffers attempted to block publication of a US Department of Health and Human Services study that showed PFAS could harm human health at exposure levels far below EPA’s current recommended thresholds.
Water supplies near at least 126 military bases across the US have been found to be highly contaminated with PFAS.

Bart Johnsen-Harris, clean water advocate for Environment America, issued the following statement: “PFAS is contaminating drinking water from Michigan to North Carolina, affecting up to 110 million people across America.
While today’s hearing shines a welcome spotlight on this problem, Congress and the EPA need to start treating PFAS like the public health emergency that it is.
“PFAS present significant threats to our health.
Research has shown probable links between PFAS exposure and cancer, immune system deficiencies, high cholesterol, low fertility, and developmental issues in children and infants.
Moreover, the health impacts of PFAS are magnified because they bioaccumulate in the food chain and persist for a long time in the environment.
“To date, the federal government’s response has been insufficient.
Particularly shameful was the EPA and White House’s attempted coverup of the crisis, in which they put public relations over public health.
Ensure safe drinking water for affected communities: set health protective standards for PFAS to ensure adequate clean up of contaminated drinking water.
“In our rush to resist stains and fight fire with foam, the widespread use of PFAS has repeated the tragedy we have seen with other toxic chemicals allowed on the market without proof of safety.
“Protecting our drinking water and our health going forward will require a precautionary approach: chemicals should not be rushed into the marketplace until they are proven safe, and we need to devote more of America’s ingenuity to developing safer alternatives.

Based on information from state health agencies, testing labs, scientific researchers and water filter companies, the most effective choice for in-home treatment of PFAS-tainted tap water is a reverse osmosis filter, followed by an activated carbon filter—a slightly lower-cost option.
Some of these states have issued recommendations for water filters to remove PFOA and PFOS, including: Guidance and factsheet documents from these states recommend two types of filters for removing PFAS chemicals: activated carbon and reverse osmosis.
However, drinking water can contain other PFAS chemicals, sometimes at higher levels than PFOS and PFOA.
Filter Testing by State Agencies In 2007, the Minnesota Department of Health commissioned testing of home water filters to determine their efficacy in removing PFAS.
Six activated carbon filters and eight reverse osmosis filter types were tested.
These filters that were tested for removal of a dozen PFAS chemicals, including both long-chain and short-chain compounds.
The four reverse osmosis systems also removed between 95 and 99 percent of short-chain compounds.
Only Berkey provided EWG with test data for their carbon filters, which reported removal of nine PFAS chemicals, including PFOA and PFOS, all below the detection limit of 2 ppt.
Reverse osmosis systems remove a wider range of other contaminants from drinking water and their effectiveness can be tested at home using an electrical conductivity meter.
You can also consider an activated carbon filter that will most often provide effective removal.

"I know we all keep asking the same question, but I think what’s got everybody worried is we need to change the national standard for what is a safe level," U.S. Rep. Debbie Dingell, D-Dearborn, told an EPA official.
The agency is evaluating the need to set a maximum contaminant level for the well-known PFAS compounds PFOA and PFOS, said Peter Grevatt, director of the agency’s Office of Ground Water and Drinking Water.
The head of Michigan’s PFAS “response team,” Carol Isaacs, told lawmakers on the panel that more federal funding is needed for the Pentagon to fully remedy PFAS contamination at military sites.
"There are obviously concerns about setting an EPA drinking water standard.
Dingell asked Grevatt why the EPA didn’t schedule a stop in Michigan as part of its PFAS “community engagement” tour, which included visits to five states since June.
At the hearing, Republican Reps. Fred Upton of St. Joseph and Tim Walberg of Tipton backed Dingell’s invitation for EPA to hold a community forum in Michigan.
Isaacs later said, "Michigan has always wanted the EPA to come in, and we look forward to that."
"We’ve been disappointed in the pace of response" by the Department of Defense, Isaacs said.
The state intends to test all 461 schools on a private well system by year’s end, Isaacs said, and has already undertaken testing of all public water systems through a $1.7 million appropriation from the Legislature.
Isaacs was among those urging the federal government to move forward with additional research and setting an enforceable standard for PFAS in drinking water.

Donovan appeared on Capitol Hill on Thursday, Sept. 6, to call for action on toxic PFAS contamination that threatens many more than just North Carolinians.
Thirty-eight states have found PFAS in groundwater, she said.
The absence of both federal drinking water standards as well as regulation under federal Superfund law is creating uncertainty for regulators and communities, he said.
Testing in states like Michigan is turning up a wide range of PFAS chemicals – much more than just PFOS and PFOA, the two with an EPA health advisory level.
The EPA was represented at the hearing by Peter Grevatt, the office of groundwater and drinking water director who has been visiting multiple states this summer as part of the agency’s plan to develop a nationwide regulatory framework for PFAS by January.
He stopped short of committing the EPA to developing a national drinking water standard for PFAS, saying one of the actions the agency is "committed to is to consider whether we should consider maximum contaminant level for PFOA and PFOS."
In response to a question by Rep. Fred Upton, R-St Joseph, Grevatt said the agency has no plans to reconsider the existing health advisory level for PFOS and PFOA, which has come under significant fire this summer after the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry (ATSDR) published a draft report with PFAS risk levels which are substantially lower.
Upton pressed the Department of Defense deputy assistant secretary Maureen Sullivan on why testing results at the Battle Creek Air National Guard Base were held up in Pentagon bureaucracy for months when the state of Michigan was able to respond to high levels of PFAS found in the city of Parchment water this summer in a matter of days.
Upton held a sheet with testing results showing that groundwater is contaminated with PFOS and PFOA at 76,000-ppt at the base.
Isaacs said the state of Michigan has been disappointed with the overall pace of military response to PFAS contamination, pointing out that the linear process for investigating contamination under Superfund law, or CERCLA, allows for significant delay.