Water board sets standard for problem solving

People get mighty concerned when questions are raised about their water supply, because it’s the most essential element in life.

That’s not because, as author Karen Salmansohn observed, “Without it you can’t make coffee.” It’s not even because you’ll die a whole lot sooner from lack of water than lack of food.

Getting scientifically technical, it’s because water is the one substance that, according to Kids Discover, delivers nutrients to and carries waste away from cells (not just human ones), and because paired with electrolytes it allows electrical signals to travel along nervous systems.

So Gadsden residents and others who use the city’s water supply should be happy and relieved at last week’s announcement by the city’s Water Works and Sewer Board.

A new granular-activated carbon treatment facility, with a daily capacity of 6 million gallons, has been completed and should improve the removal of chemicals from the water it processes.

Think back to three years ago, when the Environmental Protection Agency drastically strengthened its health advisory limits for nasty-sounding chemicals like Perfluorooctanoic Acid and Perfluorooctane Sulfonate that are considered to be potential carcinogens.

Gadsden had been well within the previously allowed limits of those concoctions, but after the new standard came out, it was the subject of a drinking water advisory by the Alabama Department of Public Health (which ultimately was withdrawn) and got placed on a list of at-risk water systems. We don’t have the sales figures, but it wouldn’t be stepping off into the ether to say bottled water sales locally got pretty brisk.

The water board later that year sued chemical suppliers and carpet and textile plants in Dalton, Georgia, up the Coosa River from Gadsden, because of the high concentrations of PFAs in the river, from which the system draws its water. They contend the stuff is getting into the water there and ultimately flowing here.

That court case is pending and perhaps the city will get what it’s seeking — compensation for the expense of removing the chemicals from the river.

Still, the city couldn’t wait on that money to address the problem, and the water board didn’t have the weapons in its arsenal at the time to bring the water plant in under the new limits. So, city officials went to work. They researched the chemicals in question, got a line on what needed to be done to remove them and in only three years — who says government always moves glacially and ponderously — had something ready to do just that.

Kudos to Chad Hare, manager of the water board, and his staff for setting a standard for problem solving and making this happen.