Drinking water security and sustainability

Abstract

There is a growing concern about the potential for contaminants to enter into water distribution systems, whether it is from aging infrastructure, acts of nature, accidents, or acts of terrorism. In 1996, the President of the United States issued an Executive Order (#13010), which established the President’s Commission on Critical Infrastructure Protection. This commission identified eight infrastructure areas as crucial and water supply systems were one of them. Water is a vital resource and is necessary to sustain human life and other living things. In order to provide water to the population, as an example, the U.S. has more than 160,000 public water systems. After the 9/11 terrorist attacks, there has been much focus on safeguarding the U.S. water supply. Discussed here are: potential vulnerabilities and threats to the water supply infrastructure, challenges and emerging technologies, and the role of public policy in ensuring a safe water source. Vulnerabilities and threats As a standard practice, water infrastructure designers, managers, and operators are typically prepared in the event of a natural disaster. Natural disasters also afford them the advantage of being able to predict these events before their occurrence. Prior to the September 11 attacks, the risks of manmade threats were focused on acts of vandalism or theft, whereas now, the concern also relates to terrorism. Based on vulnerability, physical components and control centers are most susceptible to tampering because there are currently no rigorous security measures in place to protect them. The control centers are at risk to the more sophisticated threats, some related to cyber attacks. If the system is hacked, potential threats are that viruses could be transmitted, valves could be opened and closed improperly, treatment processes could be tampered with, and water quality and security can be impaired. Direct threats to water systems can generally be categorized into four groups: contamination of untreated supplies (raw water), contamination of treated supplies (finished water), threats to the physical facilities of the water utility, and the threat of introduction of contaminants. Challenges, current and emerging technologies Major challenges to water security lie in: detecting the threat, identifying the contaminant in a timely manner, and then treating and eliminating the threat. Another challenge is that the water supply and water systems are highly variable due to the number of community systems present and the populations they service. Also, the water sources are not constant across all communities; as an example, in the U.S., 53% of all drinking water comes from groundwater while the remainder comes from surface water. There is a need for a robust detection system as well an effective early warning monitoring system. The current status of water utilities calls for routine monitoring of water supplies, however, threats cannot be analyzed real-time to detect threats and determine the presence of exotic contaminants. In most cases, the main problem is that traditional methods are time consuming and can take hours, if not days, to detect the threat and analyze the extent of contamination. Presently, there are many commercially available technologies that are able to detect water quality parameters such as pH, chlorine, total organic carbon (TOC), conductivity and temperature which can all be measured realtime. There are technologies that can measure turbidity, R. Jain (&) School of Engineering and Computer Science, University of the Pacific, Stockton, CA, USA e-mail: rjain@pacific.edu