When Jan Verspecht returned in November to his Fountaingrove home, which miraculously survived the Tubbs fire, he turned on the water and noticed a strange odor.
When he heard that the water in his area was contaminated with benzene, a chemical city officials believe originated from melting plastic pipes and system components, he was actually relieved.
“As soon as I heard it was only benzene, I was like ‘OK.
But Verspecht, who doesn’t have training in water quality issues, is convinced he has found a way to easily remove any traces of the compound from the city-supplied water that flows into his Fountaingrove home.
Engineers solve problems,” Verspecht, who is from Belgium and who moved to Santa Rosa in 2012 after Keysight purchased his startup company.
The solution Verspecht came up with was to install a $5,000 whole-house activated carbon water filter, which he said has removed all traces of toxic compounds.
“I can guarantee it, the water that we drink is the purest that any Santa Rosan can drink,” Verspecht told the City Council recently.
“There is hope.” City officials have been under tremendous pressure to figure out how to restore clean water to an area of 350 homesites in Fountaingrove with contaminated water mains.
Residents trying to figure out how to rebuild were not pleased and told the city that if it didn’t find a better solution, there wasn’t going to be anyone returning to the area.
After originally resisting the idea of installing filtration systems, Ben Horenstein, director of Santa Rosa Water, now says it could be just the break the city needs.

City officials tested some 2,000 water samples after the fire, and have now concluded the contamination came from plastic water supply pipes that melted in the fire.
Santa Rosa’s problem, however, is the first known case of plastic pipes causing widespread water contamination after a fire.
“We now know that the combustion, the burning, the melting of various plastic components in our distribution system gave off constituents that got into the water system,” said Bennett Horenstein, Santa Rosa’s director of water.
Thirteen Fountaingrove homes survived the fire and remain exposed to the contamination.
The long-term solution, said Horenstein, involves replacing the entire water supply system in the affected Fountaingrove neighborhood, including underground water mains that did not melt.
Some samples taken from the Fountaingrove neighborhood after the Tubbs Fire detected benzene at 80 times that limit.
Horenstein said there’s nothing unique about Santa Rosa’s water system or the materials used in its plumbing.
First, plastic water system components in homes – faucets, water lines in walls and crawl spaces – burned and melted in the fire.
The chemicals generally like to be in the plastic and not so much in the water.” Plastic pipes, in other words, are permeable.
He defended the organization’s testing protocol, and said it is willing to consider new testing methods.

In the most detailed explanation yet of the unfolding water crisis, city officials outlined in a public meeting how they believe the water system serving 350 home sites in the devastated neighborhood became contaminated with a cancer-causing hydrocarbon, and just how complicated, costly and time-consuming its replacement may be.
The contamination problem has been known since November, and the city has been open in recent months that its investigation into the source was zeroing in on melting plastic pipes and other components of the water system.
Carol Ellen, 70, said she and her partner had already spent $60,000 in various architectural fees and other costs preparing to rebuild, only to learn recently from the city that it might not be possible.
“We are ready to begin building in May.
“Where does our water come from?” John Stratton, a Fountaingrove resident and engineer at Keysight Technologies said he relied on the city’s earlier “worst-case scenario” that a full replacement might take a year.
“What I see here today, it might be the commitment is to move out of state.” City officials said the water-system work would have to be done while other contractors were busy rebuilding homes in the area, complicating the overhaul.
But Stratton said city officials were kidding themselves.
City water officials, led by Ben Horenstein, director of Santa Rosa Water, outlined in detail how the city responded to the discovery of benzene in the system, leading to an investigation that has identified where it came from and how it got into the system.
Emma Walton, a water refuse engineer, explained that benzene, a hydrocarbon and a human carcinogen typically associated with gasoline, can leach out of plastics when heated to high temperatures.
Tests that showed that when burned materials were soaked in clean water, the water came away contaminated with benzene and other hydrocarbons.

Some drinking water in Santa Rosa remains undrinkable months after the North Bay fires, and pressure is mounting on the city’s water department to locate and control the cause.
“The city is very interested to get people back and rebuilt into their homes, of course, as soon as possible,” says Bennett Horenstein, the City of Santa Rosa’s Water Director.
Then its tests found benzene, a chemical that can cause cancer.
“This contamination is certainly attributable to the fire,” says Horenstein, “specifically the heating and burning of different plastic components in the system.” Initial sampling found benzene in the Fountaingrove water main, the local service components, and the lines that connected to destroyed properties.
The water lines in that part of Santa Rosa lost pressure in the fire, which officials say could have helped benzene to spread further when equipment melted.
Initial samples found 87 instances where that limit was exceeded, mostly, but not exclusively, in the Fountaingrove neighborhood.
Horenstein stressed that the benzene in areas outside Fountaingrove was less pervasive, and had not been found in the city’s mains.
Still, water department investigators now are looking for melted plastic components, benzene, and explanations in Coffey Park as well as Fountaingrove.
“We’re just seeing some, maybe 10 percent of these homes, have concerns with benzene.
But he acknowledges Santa Rosa’s problems may have implications for future fires in other cities.