The Greensboro Water Resources Department has released its annual report on water quality.
The “Annual Drinking Water Quality – Consumer Confidence Report” is available for review at www.greensboro-nc.gov/CCR.
Much of what is in the report is in the form of charts that aren’t easy to follow, but some of the report is basic information about the water that flows through the pipes all over Greensboro.
Greensboro gets its water from three lakes north of the city – Lake Higgins, Lake Brandt and Lake Townsend. Water from Lake Higgins flows into Lake Brandt and that water is treated at the Mitchell Water Treatment Plant on Battleground Avenue. Water from Lake Townsend is treated at the Townsend Water Treatment Plant at Lake Townsend.
Greensboro also buys water from Burlington, Reidsville, Winston-Salem and the Piedmont Triad Regional Water Authority. The report covers the water produced at the Greensboro water treatment plants and not the water Greensboro purchased.
There is a long list of different types of contaminants found in the water and the report notes, “Drinking water, including bottled water, may reasonably be expected to contain at least some 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 EPA’s Safe Drinking Water Hotline 1-800-426-4791.”
Federal and state regulations require monitoring of about 120 contaminants. According to the report during the 2022 calendar year, “All substances were below regulatory limits except for Turbidity.” The turbidity did not exceed the limits, but in November the test for turbidity wasn’t continuously monitored for a time period that exceeded four hours and therefore the levels during that time could not be verified.
Two of the contaminants that have been in the news lately, PFOA and PFOS, are currently “unregulated,” which means the EPA has not established drinking water standards for those emerging contaminants. However, Greensboro’s water was well within the EPA’s current recommended limit.
However, Greensboro is spending over $30 million to upgrade the Mitchell Water Treatment Plant to remove PFOA and PFOS contaminants.
With cost increases, hopefully it is decent and safe to drink.
why spend $30M to TRY to treat this water when only ~5% goes in mouths? lets buy our drinking water from regional water sources requiring no ‘treatment’, truck (pipe) it here, & sell (give) it where people are buying their water now? people can fill their re-usable containers reducing plastic bottle trash & recycling costs?
That’s one of the thing our ever-increasing tax dollars are for. So we pay 8% more on our rate, too?
Disgusted in Guilford County.
You’re paying more for the gas, that you can live without, than for the drinking water. I think it’s very ok to maintain water infrastructure so your tap water won’t be like the one in Flint.
Can think of plenty worse ideas to use tax dollars for.
I wonder how much we spend on adding fluoride to our water? Fluoride that I then have to spend about $100 per year to filter back out of our drinking supply. We get plenty of direct application fluoride from toothpaste (which we spit out) and from dentist treatments, and I have no interest in swallowing more of it every day, but city of GSO keeps on doing it.