Consumer Confidence Report
Also called the “Water Quality Report,” is information that rates the condition of your local drinking water quality. It contains the source of your drinking water, a list of contaminants present, potential health effects, contaminant levels in your CCR compared to national standards, and any violations of health-based standards.
It also contains more sources of information such as EPA, your healthcare provider, and your water provider company.
A Little History on the Consumer Confidence Report (CCR)
An amendment of a federal law took effect on August 19, 1998, which requires the community water systems to send each household a detailed report of their water quality. This amendment is called the “Safe Drinking Water Act,” otherwise called the Consumer Confidence Report (CCR). According to the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), this act sets standards for drinking water quality and, with its partners, implements various technical and financial programs to secure safe drinking water.
Safe Drinking Water Act
SDWA has been repeatedly amended within over 20 years since 1974, the year it was originally passed. They made amendments to meet the needs of consumers across the United States. Most importantly, this is to protect public health by regulating the nation’s public drinking water supply.
There are more than 170,000 public water systems that provide clean drinking water to Americans. This federal law is just as crucial as refining and getting the water quality right for the American public. Thus, this report is given yearly.
When Is This Report Released?
The CCR is an annual report - also known as Water Quality Report released every July 1st. It shows the findings of the water testing from the previous year. For example, it displays information about your CCR from the previous year.
Who Receives This Report?
This law required the water companies to release this report to the residents. People who do not pay their water bills, such as those living in apartments, condos, or rent houses, may need to contact their building managers or owners. They can also check online to see if their CCR has been posted.
People who get their water from private wells are not regulated by EPA, so their CCR is not released and required. To learn more about safe water for maintaining private wells, visitPrivate GroundWater Wells of CDC.
What You’ll Learn Inside the Report
The first page of the water quality report explains the standards upheld by your public water system provider. Local water system providers tailor their CCR information containing certain elements as follows:
How to Interpret Your Water Quality Report
To understand better how the table or chart in your report flows, follow along with the number and their corresponding meaning below:
- Contaminants: As seen in this table, they are not “bad” contaminants. They are anything found in your water other than oxygen and hydrogen, which make up water. Both can be healthy and unhealthy, depending on the kind of substance and quantity.
- Maximum Contaminant Level Goal (MCLG): If you see “Your Water” value below this MCLG value, there is no expected or known risk to your health.
- Maximum Residual Disinfection Level Goal (MRDLG): If you also see the “Your Water” value is below this MRDLG value, there is also no expected or known risk to your health.
- Maximum Contaminant Level (MCL): If the value of “Your Water” is above the MCL, your water system is violating EPA’s regulations.
- Treatment Technique: A necessary process to downsize the level of a contaminant in drinking water.
- Maximum Residual Disinfection Level (MRDL): The highest level of disinfection amount in your drinking water. An optimal amount of disinfection present in the water is enough to kill the microbes and germs.
- Your Water: The actual level of a contaminant in your water during sampling.
- Range Detected: It refers to the high and low at which contaminants are detected in your drinking water.
- Sample Date: The date(s) of testing. Some contaminants may not be tested every year.
- Violation: It shows whether an excessive level of contaminant surpassed the level set by EPA.
- Typical Sources: The information where the contaminants are found commonly
Water Quality Report and Its Sections
Section 1 - Introduction, Precautions, and SourcesContaminant Name: It is the name of the substance analyzed in the water, such as lead, sulfate, chloramine, fluoride, etc. The Safe Drinking Water Act defines a “contaminant” as any physical, biological, chemical, or radiological substances or matter present in the water. EPA monitored over 90 contaminants.
Contaminant Categories: This part in the table is a line that shows what groups of contaminants fall under. This usually includes categories such as Disinfectants (like chlorine and chloramine), Inorganic Contaminants (like lead, nitrate, and fluoride), and Organic Contaminants (like benzene and atrazine). Other categories may be seen depending on your water system.
Amount detected: The quantity of each contaminant found in your water source will also be shown here.
Other Options To Consider
Bottled Water
Bottled water may cause much higher than tap water, but it may be a good temporary choice if your tap water has violations or has contamination from a local source. Natural occurrences would be during flooding.
The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) regulates bottled water for drinking. FDA also sets quality standards that are more or less equivalent to EPA’s drinking water standards. FDA also recommends that bottled water be handled like other food products and refrigerated after opening because bacteria can grow after the bottle is exposed to air.
Bottled water quality differs among all other brands because of water source, handling, and treatment variations. Water is rarely completely free of contaminants. In most cases, contaminants are present at very low levels that do not pose serious health risks.
Home Water Treatment
Home water treatment is often more cost-effective than bottled water if you are concerned about contaminants found in tap water. Water treatment systems generally use one or a combination found in tap water.
Water treatment systems generally use one or a combination of the following processes: disinfection (ultraviolet light or chlorination), filtration (including activated carbon filters), reverse osmosis, and distillation. When buying a treatment unit, make sure it is designed to remove the contaminants of concern.
How To Improve Your Water Quality
The public can no longer relax and assume safe drinking water will always be provided. Public participation is needed to protect water resources, build adequate treatment plants, improve water delivery, analyze costs vs. risks, and enact appropriate legislation.
Local citizens will guide the wellhead protection planning process. This is an excellent opportunity for anyone concerned about safe water—for today and for the future—to get involved in protecting it. Private good owners must test their water regularly and protect the area around the well.
Conclusion
The reports provide information to consumers about the quality of their drinking water. This information has always been available to consumers who requested it from their water supplier. Now it is provided in an easy-to-read format sent to your home.
The guiding principle behind making water quality reports public is that the people have the right to know what is in their drinking water and their water source. Informed and involved citizens make wiser decisions. These decisions include investments made to protect and improve water quality, such as wellhead protection or treatment system upgrades. Consumer "right to know" is an essential theme of environmental protection today.
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