Public Information    ------    2002 Water Quality Report   ------   June 2003

As part of 1996 amendments to the Clean Water Act, owners of community water systems are required to prepare and distribute consumer confidence reports containing information on the source(s) and quality of water distributed by their systems.  The following is an annual report on the source and quality of water delivered by the Lower Saucon Authority water system.

General Water System Information

The Lower Saucon Authority owns and operates a water distribution system serving portions of Lower Saucon Township, Northampton County, and limited parts of the Borough of Fountain Hill, Lehigh County.  The system operates under a permit issued by the PA Department of Environmental Protection, PWS #3480027.  The address to contact the Authority is noted above. The Authority’s Administrator is Mr. Gar W. Davidson.  Regular business hours are Monday through Friday, 8:00 AM to 4:00 PM.  Regular meetings of the Authority Board are held on the third Tuesday of each month, at 7:00 PM, in the Authority office, and are open to the public.  The Authority phone number is 610-317-3212; the fax number is 610-317-3216. In the event of an after hours emergency please call the Northampton County Control Center at 610-330-2200. The Authority  has a website at http://www.lowersauconauthority.org and can be reached by e-mail at lsaws@enter.net.

Source(s) of Water

All water distributed by the Lower Saucon Authority comes from the City of Bethlehem water system.  There are no connections between the Lower Saucon Authority system and any other water system source, other than the City of Bethlehem. The Bethlehem system’s water comes entirely from surface sources, namely the Wild Creek Reservoir, Towamensing Township, Carbon County, and the Penn Forest Reservoir, Penn Forest Township, Carbon County and Polk Township, Monroe County, in a watershed that covers 17 square miles.  This primary water supply is located 22 miles north of the City.  The Tunkhanock Creek, Tunkhanock Township, Monroe County provides a supplemental supply to the Penn Forest reservoir.  Dual transmission mains can carry up to 47 million gallons of water per day to the City’s water filtration plant in Lehigh Township, Northampton County, and from there to the distribution system. More information about the City’s water system is available on the World Wide Web at http://www.bethlehem-pa.gov .

Contaminants in Drinking Water

In order to ensure that tap water is safe to drink, EPA prescribes regulations, which limit the amount of certain contaminants in water provided by public water systems.  Food and Drug Administration (FDA) regulations establish limits for contaminants in bottled water, which must provide the same protection for public health.

Drinking water, including bottled water, may reasonably be expected to contain at least small amounts of some contaminants. The presence of contaminants does not necessarily indicate that water poses a health risk.  More information about contaminants and potential health effects can be obtained by calling the Environmental Protection Agency’s Safe Drinking Water Hotline, at 1-800-426-4791, or on the World Wide Web at http://www.epa.gov/safewater/hfacts.html.  The Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection also maintains an excellent website at http://www.dep.state.pa.us.

The sources of drinking water (both tap water and bottled water) include rivers, lakes, streams, ponds, reservoirs, springs, and wells.  As water travels over the surface of the land or through the ground, it dissolves naturally-occurring minerals and, in some cases, radioactive material, and can pick up substances resulting from the presence of animals or from human activity. 

Contaminants that may be present in source water before it is treated include:

Ø       Microbial contaminants, such as viruses and bacteria, which may come from sewage treatment plants, septic systems, agricultural livestock operations and wildlife.

Ø       Inorganic contaminants, such as salts and metals, which can be naturally-occurring or result from urban storm water runoff, industrial or domestic wastewater discharges, oil and gas production, mining or farming.

Ø       Pesticides and herbicides, which may come from a variety of sources such as agriculture, storm water runoff, and residential uses.

Ø       Organic chemical contaminants, including synthetic and volatile organic chemicals, which are by-products of industrial processes and petroleum production, and can also come from gas stations, urban storm water runoff, and septic systems.

Ø       Radioactive contaminants, which can be naturally occurring or be the result of oil and gas production and mining activities.

Special Additional Health Information

Some people may be more vulnerable to contaminants in drinking water than the general population.  Immuno-compromised persons such as persons with cancer undergoing chemotherapy, persons who have undergone organ transplants, people with HIV/AIDS or other immune system disorders, some elderly, and infants can be particularly at risk from infections.  These people should seek advice about drinking water from their health care providers.  EPA and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention  (CDC) guidelines on appropriate means to lessen the risk of infection by Cryptosporidium and other microbial contaminants are available from the Safe Drinking Water Hotline at 1‑800‑426‑4791.

Infants and young children are typically more vulnerable to lead in drinking water than the general population.  It is possible that lead levels at your home may be higher than at other homes in the community as a result of materials used in your home’s plumbing.  If you are concerned about elevated lead levels in your home’s water, you may wish to have your water tested and flush your tap for 30 seconds to 2 minutes before using tap water.  Additional information is available from the Safe Drinking Water Hotline at 1-800-426-4791.

Water Quality Data for Calendar Year 2002

The following water quality data table lists all the contaminants that were detected during monitoring for the 2002 calendar year. The presence of these contaminants in the water does not necessarily indicate that the water poses a health risk.   Definitions of the terms and abbreviations used in the table are given below:

Ø       AL:  Action Level, or the concentration of a contaminant which, when exceeded, triggers treatment or other requirements which a water system must follow.

Ø       MCL: Maximum Contaminant Level, or the highest level of a contaminant that is allowed in drinking water.  MCLs are set as close to the MCLGs as feasible using the best available treatment technology.

Ø       MCLG: Maximum Contaminant Level Goal, or the level of a contaminant in drinking water below which there is no known or expected risk to health.  MCLGs allow for a margin of safety.

Ø       MRDL:   Maximum Residual Disinfectant Level, The highest level of a disinfectant (such as chlorine) allowed in drinking water. There is convincing evidence that addition of a disinfectant is necessary for control of microbiological contaminants.

Ø       MRDLG: Maximum Residual Disinfectant Level Goal, The level of a drinking water disinfectant below which there is no known or expected health risks. MDRLG’s do not reflect the benefits of the use of disinfectants to control microbiological contaminants.

Ø       n/a: Not applicable.

Ø       nd: Not detectable at testing limit.

Ø       ppb: Parts per billion or micrograms per liter.  One part per billion corresponds to one minute in 2000 years or a single penny in $10,000,000.

Ø       ppm: Parts per million or milligrams per liter.  One part per million corresponds to one minute in 2 years or a single penny in $10,000.

Ø       pCi/l: Picocuries per liter, a measure of radioactivity.

Ø       TT:  Treatment Technique, A required standardized testing procedure used to determine the cloudiness of drinking water.

W A T E R      Q U A L I T Y     D A T A

As the source of our drinking water, the City of Bethlehem (City) routinely monitors water quality in accordance with State and Federal regulations.  Water quality data reported to us by the City is repeated below for your information.  As a water distributor, Lower Saucon Authority (LSA) performs certain additional tests of the water delivered from our distribution system, as noted below.  There are more than seventy contaminants regulated for their existence in drinking water. The following table only lists test results for items actually found above the detection level in water samples taken from the system.  Unless otherwise noted, the data presented in the table is from testing done between January 1- December 31, 2002. The State requires water suppliers to monitor for certain contaminants less than once per year because the concentrations of these contaminants are not expected to vary significantly from year to year.  Some of the data, though representative of the water quality in 2002, is more than one year old.

Footnotes

1.        The City of Bethlehem has been adding fluoride to their drinking water since June, 1971.

2.        During the month of January and June there were two locations out of 100 routine sample sites and in April there was one location out of 100 routine sample sites, all in the City of Bethlehem’s system, that Coliform bacteria were detected. Check samples at all locations came back negative.

3.        One sample tested at 0.045MGL in the initial testing two retests both showed <0.005 (none detected)

4.        These results are based on the average of the average of 100 monthly samples.

5.        Turbidity is a measure of the cloudiness of the water. It is monitored by the City because it is a good indicator of the effectiveness of their filtration system.

Additional copies of this Water Quality Report are available at the Authority office. Lower Saucon Authority would appreciate it if large volume water customers such as landlords, employers, and commercial establishments open to the public post extra copies of these reports in conspicuous locations or distribute them to your tenants, residents, patients, students, and/or employees.  This action will allow individuals who consume the water Lower Saucon Authority delivers, but are not billed as customers, to learn about our water system.

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