By Jennifer Nations, Water Resource Coordinator
New and existing College Station residents often ask the same questions about our drinking water:
- Why is our water so soft?
- Why does it smell like chlorine?
- Does my drinking water contain lead?
- Does the City add fluoride?
- What about that stuff called PFAS?
If those topics are on your mind, the answers are at your fingertips in the City of College Station’s annual Drinking Water Quality Report, also known as the Consumer Confidence Report. The report is issued by July 1 each year and serves as a report card about how your drinking water measures up to federal and state regulations.
The Safe Drinking Water Act has required Consumer Confidence Reports for over 20 years, providing the public with information about their drinking water sources and indicating if contaminants have been detected. If contaminants are present, the reports show the amount and whether they might have health effects.
We use water for essential things such as cleaning, cooking, sanitation, and growing our food. Do we get this level of detail about any other daily-use products?
The water quality test results are presented in separate tables, each telling a distinct story. The first group of tables – including coliform test results, disinfectant levels, disinfection by-products, inorganic contaminants, and lead and copper results – has regulatory limits established under the Safe Drinking Water Act. Exceeding those limits is a violation.
We’re pleased to report once again that we have NO violations!
College Station Water Services monitors disinfectant levels and potential bacterial contamination by collecting over 110 samples each month from throughout our distribution system. To make the tables easier to understand, we’ve added a “Yes/No” column.
The answers to questions about our water’s softness or its sodium and mineral content can be found in the “Secondary Constituents” table on page 5.
The overall takeaway from this year’s Drinking Water Quality Report, as with previous reports, is that the City continues to have an outstanding record of compliance, thanks to our dedicated operators. Your water utility operators work diligently every day to ensure that your water is safe to drink.
After all, our families are drinking it, too!
About the Blogger
Jennifer Nations has been the City of College Station’s water resource coordinator since 1999 after two years as BVSWMA’s environmental compliance officer. She’s also chair of the Water Conservation and Reuse Division for the Texas Section of the American Water Works Association. A native of Fremont, Calif., Jennifer earned a bachelor’s degree in environmental & resource science from UC-Davis in 1995 and a master’s degree in water management & hydrologic science from Texas A&M in 2016.
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