Comments on: No cryptosporidium found in Bull Run /news/2010/02/09/no-cryptosporidium-found-in-bull-run-bldgc/ Building and Construction News in Portland, Oregon and the Pacific Northwest Sun, 14 Feb 2010 17:54:15 +0000 hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=6.6.6 By: S.Stewart /news/2010/02/09/no-cryptosporidium-found-in-bull-run-bldgc/#comment-11586 Sun, 14 Feb 2010 17:54:15 +0000 /?p=46982#comment-11586 CH2MHill is reportedly part of the team that collects the samples up in Bull Run. These samples determine the fate of our variance. Dirty samples mean we have to buy another treatment plant. CH2MHill stands to make millions of dollars should these samples come back dirty, becasue they build and manage treatment plants. This seems like a conflict of interest ratepayers should be m,indful of.

]]> By: Floy Jones /news/2010/02/09/no-cryptosporidium-found-in-bull-run-bldgc/#comment-10610 Thu, 11 Feb 2010 00:30:25 +0000 /?p=46982#comment-10610 The public should know that extensive testing at the outlet of Portland’s open reservoirs at Tabor and Washinton Park, testing occured over a year-long period related to Portland’s participation in an AwwarF 3021 study also showed no evidence of the parasite for which EPA is requiring that systems with open reservoirs either additionally “treat” or “cover” This data could save ratepayers up to $403 million if utilized to secure the available SDWA “treatment technique” variance.

New York has compiled 161 pages of data in support of their Hillview open reservoirs.

The City of Portland Official Statement accompanying the February 2, 2010 sale of a $72 million Water Bond states that the “cover or treat ” reservoir requirement is required to inactiviate Crypto, Giardia and other viruses. In otherwords a requirement to “treat” for a problem that doesn’t exist..

The extensive open reservoir outlet testing took place between May 2008 and May 2009.

The EPA LT2 negotiated regulation contains no scientific data on open reservoirs, just a single 1997 study that concludes that burying or covering open reservoirs is problematic. In part the study refers to the unique public health problem with buried and covered storage, cancer-causing nitrification that occurs in the absence of sunlight. EPA has not documented any public health problems with open reservoirs.

Ratepayers are facing the doubling of water bills in the next 4 years for projects with no measurable public health benefit.

With regard to the source water sampling, the testing method required by EPA (HV 1623) is flawed in that it does not destinguish between harmless and harmful varieties of Cryptosporidium. It also does not determine if the organism known as an oocyst is dead (harmless) or alive. While the Portland Water Bureau says that they will further test for genotype they have not committed to testing to determine if the parasite is dead.

EPA is expected to modify its flawed sampling method by 2015 when another round of nationwide sampling of 50L per month is scheduled to begin. But EPA is requireing the use of the flawed methodology and is requiring that Portland sample thousands of liters per month not the 50 L that are required of the systems with sewage in their watersheds.

The 1993 incident in Milwaukee Wisconsin that caused deaths and illness was a result of a sewage contamination of drinking water in a system with a state of the art filtration plant that failed. Bull Run has no sources of human or cow sewage. Bovine and human Crypto genotypes are the two proven to be problematic to humans.

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