Hi, all
This is our first Cooperative Thinking Exercise.
For two weeks (that’s our initial intention) we are invited to focus on Water. Later we may focus on power, food, communications, leadership. When we are more people we will be able to work in parallel on different themes, integrate, etc. But for now it might be better to just focus (and learn how to do it).
Monotreme started working on Water Supply over the weekend, and Okieman started his own thread.
So we’ve resurfaced an oldish idea that might be more successful now: gather our collective brain power around each of the main issues. clark – at 17:14 in another thread put it suscinctly : “get our brains collectively around this challenge”.
So this is an experiment within an experiment. A nested experiment if you wish.
The aim for this “exercise” (serious, but an exercise) might be to follow this suggested sequence or parallel “areas”:
Monotreme, Okieman, please lead us!
My thinking falls in several levels on water, first is the sanitary level of the city supply and then on down if further services fail. I added a solar water system with a 200 gallon tank to the house, kept the 80 gallon hot water tank in line even though it was replaced by a flash heater for gas hot water. It cost nothing more than a little time and a couple of fittings to plumb the old hot water tank in to the feed line ahead of the solar tank.
Ahead of everything in the water input lines I’ve install valves and fittings to switch the flow through a 1 micron filter and UVC water sterilizer so I can clean all water coming into the house. Ahead of all this I have an anti-back flow valve that will prevent the back draining of my tanks. Water pressure my stay up but the system here may run out of chemicals is the theory behind what I’ve done. The system may also go intermittent so the valve will allow the system to fill backup if pressure should return. I used the UV sterilizer because the power draw is so low (40 watts) I can run it on solar power and a small inverter. I can for see the power being down while still having water pressure delivering questionable quality water and having gas to heat it. No dishwasher but still have a safe hot shower!
If/when water system goes completely I’ve gotten a water bladder that will ride in the back of my most economical vehicle, a couple of six gallon plastic cans that could either be hand carried, carried in a bicycle trailer, even pulled in a kids wagon. Hauling water from outside sources is hard work so advance thought should be put into how you will move something that weighs over 8 lbs. per gallon. Water delivered by water trucks is going to have to be considered questionable but again the movement from the truck to home needs to be considered.
I have two water pumps, one clean and one dirty, as after looking at the first one I felt sanitizing a pump was to risky. I also have a small 12v battery that will power the pumps and that can be recharged from the solar electrical system.
I have made a filter for end of the dirty pump pick from a watering ball covered with a CLEAN gym sock over some fine mesh nylon, mostly to keep dirt and sand out of the finer filter and pump. After the dirty pump I have spun plastic 20 micron filter that can be cleaned for reuse. With this rig I can fill either the bladder or the cans from many sources.
Once the water is carried home the dirty pump will move the water from storage through finer filters and the UV sterilizer to the bigger storage tanks. Once the water is moved and further cleaned, bleach is mixed from pool shock for adding to the new water and used to clean all the gear.
The second pump is attached to the big tanks and used to deliver water to either portable storage or to the house system. While not absolutely needed the second pump will save much work and make life easier for the small cost as well as providing a spare pump if the dirty pump fails. The dirty pump is most needed to push questionable water through the filters and UV sterilizer.
I also have what I call a “dirty” bucket that be filled with water and bleach for circulation through the pump, hoses, filter and storage medium.
I have a well that never runs dry, so no concerns for city water.
I expect more or less continuous electric service to pump my well. Locally, we have 5 power generation plants, one large, 4 small, including 3 gas fired and two hydro plants.
I have 250 gallons of storage in my hot water tank and well surge tanks. A guy in our neighborhood who services local wells says he would venture to those wells with a portable generator to fill associated storage tanks in case of an emergency. We were discussing a bird flu emergency.
Our municiple water system takes water from a large mountain lake and a number of wells in the local area. It makes purification process chlorine from rock salt and derives power for that process from on-site hydro. I don’t treat my well water, but if I had any pandemic concern (and I don’t), I could add small amounts of clorox as additional precaution.
This forum thread is our “conversation space”. The “structured-information space” is here.
Just imagine we are around a big table where there’s a map we are filling in with details. We talk (conversation) and we write (structured information). What we write we can later share with others!
Upon lugon’s suggestion to shift to this thread, I’m reposting what I posted on the “Do You Know Where Your Water Comes From” thread. I might suggest that each person that posts here title their entry as “Private Water Supply” or “Public Watet Supply” to delineate what their comment is directed towards. I think that might assist in clarity for the reader. Below is what I posted earlier on the other thread:
Do you know where your water comes from?
Public water systems utilize three types of water sources: groundwater (wells), surface water (lakes, rivers), and springs (many times considered groundwater under the influence of surface water).
Groundwater usually (but not always) receives very little treatment before being sent into the system. Usually just chlorine is added. Even if the availibility of chlorine disappears the water will likely still be fine to drink. The real issue for the water system will be electricity and spare parts.
For surface water (and springs under the influence of surface water) a treatment plant must be used to make the water potable. Several types of chemicals are utilized in this treatment process. For these water systems the availability of chemicals will be a critical issue, in addition to electricity and spareparts.
If you want to know where your water comes from, and also if there have been any violations of drinking water quality standards in the past year, then ask your public water supply for a document call a “Consumer Confidence Report” (CCR). These documents are required by law in the U.S. to be developed and made available to the public once a year. Your water system may even have it on-line if they have a website.
If you visit with the manager of your water system about the CCR it might be a good opportunity to discuss Emergency Response/Contingency Plans and what happens in case of an emergency such as pandemic flu. Is there backup generators, spare parts in stock, extra chemicals in stock, backup personnel or employees trained in multiple tasks? After 911 many of the water systems across the country have developed Emergency Response/Contingency Plans. In fact, if they have a population over 3300 they have been required to do so, along with a Vulnerability Assessment to evaluate their risk to terrorism, vandalism etc.
I work in the water industry, so I am speaking with some degree of knowledge about this issue. Water systems are starting to get a heads up concerning pandemic flu, but as with the rest of the population there is a lot of variability concerning how serious decision makers are taking this. Though I suspect the recent news media flurry is starting some head scratching.
PS - Be polite, these are hard working people trying to do a difficult and important job.
lugon: I like your idea at about “conversation space” and “structured-information space”.
A question I would like to ask Okieman or any other water treatment plant expert is: what happens if the grid goes down? Will all the steps in water purification fail or just some of them? Will water still flow to users or will it stop completely? If no-one showed up to work at a water treatment plant one day what would happen? Is there a Water Treatment plant association we can approach to get its members thinking about how they would handle a severe pandemic?
Thanks in advance for help with these questions.
I had a friend in college that ran a small water plant, much like the one that serves my community. I went with him to the plant many times and from what I can remember, he just had to monitor the pumps and check things every so often. I also know that you could bypass most or all of the treatment process and still provide water to the community but it would not be safe to drink.
Okieman am I right, or have things changed a lot since then?
Lugon, this is a wonderful exercise. Thanks for launching it.
The American Water Works Association is a trade association of water utilities. I could not find anything specific on their site about pandemic preparedness.
Here is their home page link: http://www.awwa.org/
On the page link below, there is a sublink to a short “Water Supply After a Disaster” page. http://www.awwa.org/Advocacy/learn/info/3AskYourLocalUtility.cfm
I have no water expertise, so I am going to continue my efforts in different areas. But perhaps AWWA would be responsive to someone who wants to work with them on a pandemic awareness article for one of their newsletters.
I would like to echo what Okieman said above: “PS - Be polite, these are hard working people trying to do a difficult and important job.” (Sometimes some of us sound as if we think no one except us is taking this seriously!)
Monotreme - Here in Oklahoma over the past few years we have had two very severe ice storms in different parts of the state. Many areas were without electricity for over a week. Consequently, most water systems in the state have now purchased diesel electric generators. I worked in SE Texas and SW Louisiana after Hurricane Rita. Loss of electric service and the lack of large generators were a problem early on. I suspect water systems in these and other hurricane prone states are now proactively working to get backup generators.
To address your question concerning whether water purification will continue and water still flow if electricity is lost on a fairly long term basis (more than a day). If they do not have backup generators the simple answer is no. They have to have electricity to operate pumps to move the water and electricity to work the feeder systems to add chemical. Backup generators (and from experience after Hurricane Rita, people to guard them) are essential if the “grid” goes down. What is the likelyhood of that happening? Your guess is as good as mine. Maybe someone on the FluWiki that is familiar with the electric power industry can answer that one for us.
Other than electricity the availability of treatment chemicals and spare parts will be the next physical weak link (as opposed to human weak link). Some of the chemicals a treatment plant uses could be suspended and still produce potable water, ie- chemicals used to soften water, fluoride, etc. There is a lot of variability in the types of water treatment plants being used and the chemical/physical composition of the source waters. Most groundwater simply needs chlorine added. If this is not available then depending upon the wells depth, how it is sealed and maintained, it probably can still be sent to the customer and it be safe. In other words, in my opinion, water from the majority of public water supply wells will still be safe to drink even if chlorine is not available. For most groundwater, adding chlorine can be considered an insurance policy against contamination (such as an occurance of backflow if pressure is lost).
The personnel issue is a tricky one. I believe water system (and wastewater) personnel should be ranked right up with health personnel and first responders for antivirals/vaccines. Think back to New Orleans and the water issue. Lose drinking water availability and chaos breaks out in a very short time. (Wastewater is another issue, but let me ask you, would you want to go to work at a wastewater treatment plant during a flu pandemic? If someone doesn’t, then all that waste will start backing up. Consider the health issues from that. Not a pretty thought.) Water systems usually work on a tight budget concerning number of personnel hired. Usually they do not have a large surplus of certified operators. For this reason there needs to be cross training with other personnel in case one person is incapacitated (due to sickness or fear).
There are two major national associations in the water industry: The National Rural Water Association which represents small water systems (under 10,000 population), and the American Water Works Association composed mostly of the larger water systems (above 10,000 population). (The National Rural Water Association is composed of state rural water associations. All of these have websites, except I think Hawaii.)
I am sure that both of these associations recieve information from the Dept. of Homeland Security and are aware of that department’s concern about a Flu Pandemic. In my opinion, this issue is just now coming up on the radar screen for most water systems. If you visit with your local water system about Bird Flu, please recognize this and try to be patient. Folks are sometimes hesitant to discuss something if they have not educated themselves about it yet. I know we all here in Wikiland feel like time may be running out, but pressing too hard on your local officials before they are up to speed on this could backfire. (Just my opinion.)
Hillbilly Bill - Yes, surface water could be pumped from the water source and through the treatment plant without treating it. It would not be safe to drink though.
I live in a small community and I was thinking about (because you can be sure that our PTB won’t do it) starting to make up a list of people who COULD at a pinch run the pumping station and even the power station. Retired workers could be brought into play (especially in the event that the older folks aren’t as badly hit) even if it was only how to advise a couple of others! Obviously if you live in a huge city this is not an option but for those in smaller communities there might be some mileage?
Okieman - how hard is the water testing part of the process? Is it something that could be taken on by a smart layperson? or would it be better to leave the water untreated and make sure that people know that? Problem with that is that if people haven’t prepped they won’t have water treatment stuff available!
What about the possibility of setting up a schedule that assumes short staffing and scarce chemicals? So that water would be on a certain number of hours per day or per week, at set times, so that people could fill up their at-home storage tanks with potable water.
Rainwater collection would help take care of washing, watering the garden, etc. At the Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center in Texas, there’s a system of cisterns and an aqueduct to collect rainwater for irrigation. Here’s a link. They were financed by grants and donors, of course. And setting up systems like this takes time. But it seems that using old-fashioned, low-tech approaches like this would work in a pandemic.
It appears to me that any group of people that are alive today had enough water yesterday. Other than that, circumstances will be different.
Maybe we want to ask somebody “in charge” of the local water system this question: Who is related to this system? This would give us a list of people we need to consider:
It’s people who will fall ill.
Of course we then need to ask: What skills and knowledge and other resources (fuel, electricity, chemicals, test-paper, etc) do each of them need?
I’m thinking this would be a template to bring to the real experts. We would be the “pandemic experts” bringing a spreadsheet with expected numbers of diseased, a list of systems (other than water) that might be disrupted, etc.
My hunch is it wouldn’t take too long to articulate a plan: how many people do they need to train and how, what to stockpile and where, who else to contact, etc.
The experts would get rid of us in no time! ;-)
A water guy I talked to said most waterplants generate their own chlorine now because it’s cheaper and safer. (That’s in contrast to what Osterholm told Ophra’s audience. Take your pick or make the phone call.)
If, for some reason, the local waterplant runs out of chlorine (not likely here), the approved solution (blush) is to put a little clorox in the tap water. The guy told me that one jug of clorox would last forever. Two would be fine, three would be a’plenty.
You seem to be on the topic of muni water supplies, which is fine of course, but there is a sizeable population that gets their water from personal wells. I have written a short piece about the considerations for these individuals on Okieman’s thread “Do You Know Where Your Water Comes From?”
I would hope that any permanent articles on FluWikie about water supplies would keep this segment of the population in mind.
01 February 2006 dubina – at 19:03
This thread is companion to an earlier thread titled “Power Outages” predicated on the assumption that many areas of the country would lose electric power in a pandemic owing largely to the illness of generating plant personnel and disruptions to fuel supply chains.
While it’s virtually certain that power would be disrupted at some point(s) and place(s) in time in a three-month pandemic wave in America, the mostly unchallenged belief that people planning to avoid infection by residential isolation might not have electric service for weeks and months on end seems less likely than it seems realistic.
That proposition is backed by a recent WHO statement declaring the importance of residential utility services (gas, water, electricity, etc.) to the survival of persons choosing residential isolation as their main survival strategy.
Higher priority
One of the most important conclusions was that maintaining infrastructure - water, power and the provision of food - could take a higher priority than providing care to the sick, Mr Nabarro told Reuters.
“It is maybe even more important to concentrate on the essentials of life for those who are living than it is to focus on the treatment of those who are sick,” he said.
http://www.abc.net.au/news/newsitems/200601/s1557327.htm
It’s also supported by this excerpt taken from a recent statement by HHS Secretary Michael Leavitt.
PREPARATION WILL SAVE LIVES
“It is unlikely that a pandemic can be prevented entirely. However, steps can be taken to delay its onset and to reduce its peak to a level that is less overwhelming for communities than if they were to be taken completely unprepared.”
“Fewer sick people at any given time means more open hospital beds, more healthy doctors and nurses available to treat patients and more supplies on hand. This translates to more people getting the treatments they need to survive.”
“It will also mean that there are more police patrolling the streets, more drivers delivering food and medicine and more utility workers keeping water pumping and electricity flowing.”
“With issues of coordination and communication clearly laid out in advance, the initial hours of a pandemic outbreak can be met with confidence and decisive action, rather than panic and delay. Good planning will mean that everyone will understand their role and can act effectively from the outset.”
Secretary Leavitt’s mention that preparation will save lives thus allowing more utility workers to keep water pumping and electricity flowing is useful as an indicator of policy sentiment, but it falls short of the strong signal needed to assure the public that electric power supplies will be reliable. If our power supply in pandemic conditions will indeed be more reliable than we presently suppose, and furthermore, if it’s important that people should have that reliability in mind while preparing strategies of residential isolation, then what is the strong signal of electric utility reliability, and who should send it?
As to the who of sending a strong signal, since the US electric grid is substantially interconnected and interstated, it’s regulated by FERC.
Regulation of Generation
The foundation for strong Federal involvement in the electricity industry was established in the early 1900s. The electric power industry became recognized as a natural monopoly due to its production of a product most efficiently provided in a specific location by one supplier. Because monopolies in the United States were outlawed by the Sherman Antitrust Act, regulation of the utilities was a necessity. Interstate wholesale markets and transmission became regulated by the Federal Power Commission. In 1997, regulatory authority was given to the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC). Today, FERC has jurisdiction over interstate movement of electricity by private utilities (investor-owned utilities), power marketers, power pools, power exchanges, and independent system operators (ISOs). FERC approves rates for wholesale sales of electricity and reviews rates set by the Federal Power Marketing Administrations (PMAs). FERC also confers Exempt Wholesale Generator status (a classification of generator created by the Energy Policy Act of 1992 (EPACT)) and certifies qualifying small power producers and cogeneration facilities under provisions of PURPA. An additional responsibility of FERC is licensing the construction and operation of hydroelectric power projects and enforcing the provisions of the licenses.
http://www.eia.doe.gov/cneaf/electricity/chg_stru_update/chapter3.html
As the appointed regulator of the US electric utility grid, FERC should investigate, verify and publish or otherwise announce the expected reliability of the grid in pandemic conditions.
What might FERC have to say about the security of US electric service?
To answer that question locally, I called one of our local service providers, Anchorage Municipal Light and Power. Here’s what they said.
Anchorage is served by two electric providers: Chugach Electric and Anchorage Municipal Light and Power. Chugach generates power at its Beluga Plant many miles from Anchorage, and ML&P generates at four locations: two, in the city (gas-fired) and two outside the city (hydro). The two commercial systems form an interconnected grid such that electricity from one system can be supplied to the other system and vice versa. In fact, the Anchorage grid connects to other grids in Alaska. This structure of interconnecting power grids typifies other power grids in Canada and the Lower 48 States.
How reliable might electric service be in Anchorage during a pandemic wave? In the first place, given natural gas and hydro generation, fuel isn’t likely to be problem here.
I was told that electric service had high priority in case of any emergency, and so the power companies would get whatever physical security was needed and local access to any needed parts and supplies. ML&P is prepared for some extended quarantine of its generation facilities, and I assume they could also be supported in quarantine as required by outside agents including local military.
The picture isn’t so clear in the Lower 48 where 52% of all electricity is generated at coal-fired plants. Given electricity is deemed essential to any emergency situation, particularly pandemic conditions that might dictate extended residential isolation, whatever the usual stockpile at any coal-fired power plant, one imagines the coal trains from Wyoming and elsewhere would run like the Italian Railway System under Mussolini. They would make their appointed rounds.
Turning briefly from electricity to gas, oil and refined petroleum products, other grids, not quite so obvious as the electric grid, exist for those fuels well. The grids are networks of pipelines. Of all such “grids”, electricity is probably least subject to human labor and intervention, followed by gas pipelines and distribution systems. Oil and other hydrocarbon fuels require more intervention in their further processing and utilization.
Water supplies can be networked too, as with large reservoir and aqueduct systems, but isolated residents are more likely to be concerned for the quality and reliability of their local distribution systems and processes.
Who should be concerned? Following David Nabarro’s comment, we should all be concerned, and those at the edges of utility distribution systems should be a bit more concerned than others. Those closer in might have less cause to be worried, but some cause still. It would be very useful for DHS or FERC to announce the reliability of public utilities in general and then in increasingly specific ways so as inform preparation now in progress and much more to come.
hoggie - lugon has it right about visiting with your local public water system concerning your questions. I am not an expert on the treatment process. (My work is related to trying to prevent contamination of the raw water source before it gets to the plant.)
Every treatment plant is different and they have various types of instrumentation to check to make sure that the water they are releasing from the plant is safe to drink. They routinely send water samples to approved labs for testing (according to state and federal law under the Safe Drinking Water Act).
The best way to approach this is to work with your water system manager, decision makers, elected officials and encourage them to develop a plan and take the action needed if a pandemic were to occur. Work to educate them that this type of emergency could stretch over several months and the state/federal governments are encourageing local planning for this. If you wish to volunteer in some way, do so. But recognize that these folks have been hired or elected to make the decisions for the water system and they can not turn that authority over to volunteers. It is a burden they must bear. Help them.
Sorry I have not been taking my own advise about titling postings as Public Water Supply or Private Supply. Sounded good at the time. Oh well.
Michael Donnelly – at 11:35 - Both Public and Private water supply issues need to be addressed. The vast majority of people are on a public supply though and if they go down and stay down society will start to unravel very quickly. You make a good point though about providing permanent article about private supplies.
Private water (when public is not available) Friends just had a cistern placed near their non-productive well (gal a minute or so). The well people said that a cistern was best because the water would stay clean and cold. Seems to me that if one collected water (however) and placed it in a large (200+ gal) in the ground (after it had been treated with chlorine) it would provide a supply. This could work for “city” people too if the water plant is lost. I am not sure how safe this would be others undoubtedly know more.
I live in a large, sprawling county in Florida. It used to be mainly rural except for the Tampa city-limits, but because of extreme urban growth all through the county the water issue is now a big deal. A couple of things we have experienced in recent years:
1. The obvious weather issues. Storms of all varieties can and do cause temporary “boil water” orders for different areas when possible breaches have occured in the lines … either in the lines or at the processing plant.
2. Any kind of ground pollution can impact water supplies, whether municipal or well. If the power goes out or people “go out,” monitoring stations may not be maintained. As an example, we have phosphate mining and some paper production plants in the area. They both produce a run-off that is normally captured in a retention area for storage or for processing. If these retention areas break or are breached, they impact both municipal water sources and private water sources.
3. The water system in our area is rapidly getting overwhelmed and out-dated. Individuals should be aware of what kind of shape their water delivery system is in … not just the quality of the water itself.
4. Sewage and waste. If you are living on a well, you are probably also on a septic system. Make sure both septic and well are in good shape prior.
5. Know what you neighbors are using. In several areas of our county there is a mixture of both well and municipal water systems. While one home might be on municipal water, their neighbor may be exclusively on well … or there is a mixture of municipal water but septic system or well water but municiple seweage system. If your neighbor’s system … regardless of what it is … goes bad or becomes contaminated, you’ll need to come up with potential solutions to how it could impact your water/sewer system and needs.
Private water Here is a pretty good introduction to rain water harvesting http://tinyurl.com/eldwg I used to have a link to a .gov site where plans for rain catchment systems were available for very poor (read West Virginia / Kentucky) mountain people. These plans allowed one to construct safe water systems from roof run off. Simple systems for asphalt (and other) roofs that used sand, gravel and two containers. These could be quickly constructed in any location. Seems that you have to divert the initial rainfall (its dirty) and then filter through two tanks, then store.
Hawaii is a ways from West Virginia but here is a good community site for rain water storage. http://www.harvesth2o.com/hawaii.shtml
So we want to think about alternative sources of water too, and not just treatment and delivery? I think the whole scene includes:
Do we want to look at “water systems for flu hospitals” or some other specific settings? Anything else?
(Reminder to self: I’ll want to re-read this thread in a few days in order to see if we are on track. Of course the more eyeballs the better.)
We want to have at least two “plans”: one for “water professionals” (what do you do if you are in charge?) and another for “people who will aproach professionals” (what do you do if someone else is in charge?). Maybe there are other “community roles”, such as “liason maker” etc. We’ll find out. Let’s stick to water.
Okieman - yes it is their job. In our situation, there are only 4 people who between them run the whole water supply. That doesn’t leave a lot of space for absenteeism. In looking at such an enormous event as a possible pandemic, you have to allow for the possibility that there might be no-one to do it. That was my thinking. Not a take over - but a list of those who could possibly step into the breach.
Maybe they could train people they trust (and people they don’t see often, so not ill at the same time) so they will be able to get things done, perhaps with phone counseling. A water-man internship?
I know of a hospital where they plan to do telemedicine with each other - a radiologist from hospital A can help with difficult patients in hospital B. In the case of water, this might be done with a few pictures of the buttons that need to be pushed + a simple grid: “boy, you be my hands: push a5 then release f2″.
Of course this “solution” puts pressure on telecommunications.
Maybe the trick is to have someone follow them and write down what they do, so there will be a backup. This would not be used in normal circumstances, because things may go wrong and then the person with the experience takes the responsibility. But if things are wrong already then “the intern” might just *have to* take over.
All too theoretical. We need the experts’ input, please.
Prompted by all these helpful comments I am writing in the following terms to each of my local, State and Federal elected representatives and the media. I suggest people everywhere write/email/phone/talk to the media and their elected representatives no matter what their politics or performance. I believe it is still the most likely way to focus the attention of paid experts and decision-makers on the subject.
“As the risk of a pandemic seems to be increasing, what plans does the (Council) (Government) have to address urgently the problems that could arise quickly?
Water, power, food and communications will probably be key issues. They will probably be more important than treating the ill although that will still be needed and will require the efforts of people who will be affected by the key issues too.”
how to make your own bleach from salt water, and how to use:
http://waterpot.org/BLEACH_HOW_TO/bleach_how_to.html
Self made clayfilters: how to (i think colodial silver is needed to be virus killing: http://www.ideassonline.org/pdf/br_28_60.pdf
Using solar radiation to clean water: (very easy!) http://www.sodis.ch/Text2002/T-FAQ.htm http://www.idrc.ca/en/ev-26972-201-1-DO_TOPIC.html
A lot of technologys that may be usefull: http://www.jalmandir.com/archives/cat_ceramic_filter.php
hoggie & lugon - I appreciate all of your good ideas.
It will be up to the water system to identify and train back-up personnel. A town, city, or rural water district might work with retired ex-employees. These have the advantage of being familiar with the treatment plant and water system. The second most likely pool of backup employees will be other city employees that normally do not work on the water system. For rural water districts, board members might be a good choice. All of these need to be trained ahead of time. Even the retired employees will likely need to be brought up to speed concerning changes in the plant that have taken place since their retirement.
One major question a water system will have is liability issues. Water operators are required to be licensed. A water system will need to work with its state primacy agency and work out (preferably ahead of time) a process to allow a temporary license or a waiver for backup personnel that have not gone through the training, testing and licensing process. (If I remember correctly, this is recommended in the U.S. Pandemic Plan. It has been a while since I have read over it. I will post a link later.)
If I sound bureaurocratic please forgive me, I know how these things work. This is why all of this needs to be worked out ahead of time. Your job is to encourage this to happen. (If they are unresponsive then you do what you feel like is needed to provide for your own personal water supply.) Some water systems will jump through hoops to prepare, others will ignore the risk until the last minute. They are like the rest of the population in that there is a lot of variation in degree of knowledge, wisdom and concern.
lugon - Many water treatment plants have buttons, but the job entails more than just pushing buttons. The various state rural water associations have technical assistance providers that help water systems with their problems. Usually this is done on-site. In the event of Pandemic Flu I suspect this will be done over the phone in many cases. The companys that sell water treatment chemicals will likely also be sources of information. One big problem is that there can be a lot of differences in one treatment plant from the next down the road.
hoggie - The water system should have a Emergency Contingency/Response Plan (if they serve a population over 3300) that can be used to incorporate a list of backup personnel and their expertise. Other pertinent info can also be incorporated into this document. Multiple copies should be retained in multiple locations in case one copy is lost or the lead person responsible with maintaining and implementing the plan is incapacitated.
I hope this has answered some of your questions. I reckon it has generated some additional ones.
Okieman - yes lots more questions, it will take me some time to formulate them though. I must say that I’m not sure I have a lot of faith in anyone higher up than the cleaner!!
I posted the other day that our contingency planning committee believe that only 8 or 9 people have died from BF, human to human is years away, and they haven’t even ordered masks for the ambulance personnel yet.
We have a population of 2000.
Because we are an island everything has to be shipped in but despite this there is an overwhelming belief that “no-one” would leave a small island without supplies.
I don’t hold out much hope of them being organised if it got really bad. I have water on my own patch so am not too worried from a personal point of view but I am interested in the problem.
Didn’t find the info I mentioned earlier in the U.S. Pandemic Plan about temporary water system employee issues. I need to back up on that one. I know I read some information relating to this issue some where. Maybe it was just a recommendation by someone that this be done. Please note that I may be wrong on this point.
Meanwhile you can take a look at this link: http://www.hhs.gov/pandemicflu/plan/appendixd.html
Parts of it relate to utilities and utility workers.
lugon: Thanks for organizing this thread, I think its one of the best ever at Flu Wiki.
Okieman: Thanks so much for answering my, and other people’s, questions. You answers have helped me understand the challenges involved in keeping clean water flowing during a pandemic.
Thanks to everyone else who has provided input.
I will try to digest all the great information here and add to the water page. When I’m done, I’ll ask you all to critique it here.
Monotreme - Glad to help out.
Seems to me that one simple and important thing we can do to ensure safe drinking water supplies for cities is to urge the Government to require all utility companies to stockpile several months of the necessary chlorine, etc. as well as a backup generator & its fuel. They could authorize a user surtax on the utility bills to pay for it. Spread amoung all the customers, the tax would be very small and well worth the peace of mind and water security for the consumers. Simple. Effective.
Monotreme, thanks for the kind comment and for your hard work. All, thanks for the activity; it’s encouraging. I wonder how far we will have gone in two weeks. Day by day.
When this starts we may need to provide guidance or “recomendation” to people as to how to make the best use of available water (or something in that “direction”):
Hey, just fast-read the whole thread.
To be honest, when we started I was more enthusiastic than hopeful: I thought we had to give this exercise a try, but I couldn’t even dream of the activity and ideas and links we’re all generating.
I’ll be back here as soon as I stop jumping up and down the corridor.
Link to our “structured information” space.?
:-)
Wordsmith your suggestion has some merit. My only question would how would the large municipal areas such as New York, Boston, Tampa, San Diego pull that kind of storage off without creating a biological hazard.
Here’s another idea of scavenging for water … desalinization. My spelling is probably off here; however, if you live near what you think of as a useless body of salty water this might be a way to begin to make the water useable for consumption.
Home systems are fairly low-tech … uses evaporation if I understand correctly.
In an emergency it might be an option to look into.
Are there any boaters on fluwiki? Do they make compact systems for this that are already used on long sea voyages? I have no clue despite having lived most of my life along the Gulf Coast.
Has anybody ever tried to distill water before? It’s not that difficult, and I believe with the high temps, it kills everything in it, as well as boils out the impurities. We distilled water AND wood way back in Jr. High School science class. The wood was awful, but distilling water gave me a new appreciation for how easy it is to purify water for cooking and drinking…
(Would solar distillation be possible in some areas?)
Sorry, I couldn’t say this more concisely, but why wait until pandemic comes to give the public guidance? (Here comes the wordy version)
One thought; could public education begin now?
Even if it is adding a paragraph to the next water bill, about If pandemic occurs, there would be a need to conserve water for essential purposes For The Public’s Own Good
(or for those on private well, what would work, property tax bill, some local mailing that was going out anyway, about emergency preparedness?) -because, so far, the talk about what to do if you lose water, in what people are used to in temporary emergencies, sort of assumes people have normal unrestricted water use before and after the actual disruption.
Wasting drinking water might be something people would come to regret a few months on? Does conservation help? There would be increased demand, (hospitals, homes doing more cleaning and disinfecting) so cutting out non-esential use seems important.
Wouldn’t in a long-term uncertain situation like pandemic mean that everyone should use water they do need for health/cleaning/cooking/drinking, but, stop the wasteful things like washing the car, hosing the driveway clean, watering the grass, whatever? I know in a dry summer if people aren’t reminded to limit their water use, some water systems get too low pressure to fight fires, ect.
While you might start out in a pandemic with electricity and water treatment personnel, you don’t know if you’ll have those things tomorrow, or next week, or regain them only to lose them a week or two later due to other circumstances, right?
Could part of the public education be to remind people they have to be able to hear if there was a “boil water” order, (even if the electricity was out) and know how to disinfect with bleach (and use and store it safely; they’ll be using it for cleaning, too,) make sure information is in the languages it needs to be for different households.
If H5N1 comes to an area and gets birds sick first, shouldn’t the public be being educated Now that they will be warned Then not to to swim in ponds and lakes, don’t let kids play in public water fountains, ect?
Reassure them now, if their water will still be safe to drink once birds have H5N1 in your area (if that is the case). There are always phone calls, with questions, once birds start to die. If it is not known if their (private or public) water will get the virus in it, give them a memo about that uncertainty, so they know ahead of time.
Tell the public now, what the daily water needs per person are, estimate some for cleaning and other essential purposes, do the math for them; to help make sure they stock up, not just in a general low-probability emergency way, but in a “If a pandemic strain does mutate, we will have very little notice, so, it’s better you start now if you need to buy anything rather than everyone try to wait and all do it at once when they hear” clearer importance way. [I’m a bit worried the Gulf Coast had more days of hurricane warning than we may have of human-pandemic-in-progress warning before it affects everywhere.]
Why not start now, to say thay they’d need to use water even more wisely during a pandemic than they bother to during summer water use restrictions?
I have revised the Public Water Supply? page based on the comments in this thread. Please read if you get a chance and post here if anything is wrong or should be added. Some of the comments on this thread relate to personal water supplies. I will look at the personal preps page next and try to cross-link relevant sections with the public water supply page. Michael Donnelly, I will work on a private water supply page after this is done. It also occurs to me that there might be an intermediate option that we could act on directly. One can buy water filters that can purify thousands of gallons of water. If one had one these and lived near a water source, one could set up their own very local water purification center and provide clean water for a neighborhood. I believe this is what aid workers do when they have to provide clean water quickly at refugee camps. Anyone have experience with these filters?
http://promolife.server101.com/products/bigport.htm#electricpumpunit
Units aren’t cheap, You could build your own for a lot less.
Kathy, I’m a sailor, so I guess I can take a shot at your desalinization question.
There are two basic ways to make fresh water out of salt water.
1. Reverse osmosis. Boaters use this a lot, although it is expensive. Saltwater is forced thru a special membrane that allows water molecules to pass thru it, but not the salt. There are a number of these units available, and the prices range from $600 for a manual (hand crank) model up to thousands for battery or engine powered units.
Katadyn-06 Manual Desalinator approx $600 produces roughtly 2 pints an hour
Katadyn-36 manual Desalinator approx $1400 produces roughly 1.2 gals an hour
Katadyn-40e electric (combo 12 volt/manual) Desalinator produces roughly 1.5 gals an hour drawing 4amps
These units are used on small cruising boats and are often found in life rafts.
Downsides. Expensive Low output. Filters do get clogged and are expensive to replace. Sediment found close to shore, in harbors, etc. tend to clog filters faster than water found in open ocean.
More expensive engine run systems run thousands more, but can produce 20,40, 100 gals an hour. Big commerical ships can run even bigger units. Very big bucks, tho.
2. Boiling and capturing/condensing steam.
Energy intensive, but easy to do. If you have a heat source, a containment vessel, and some copper tubing, you’re in business. Added bonus, left over salt.
Simplest method is a teakettle with a coil of copper tubing. Basically, a miniature still.
http://www.epsea.org/stills.html
If you live where the sun is strong, this looks interesting.
destilling water is a very energi demanding techinque, and is most usefull for treating salt water.. Sweet water, a filter and heating to 70´c is less energy demanding. And a filter used with chlorine is even better, and if water is clear, clorine is enough.. or UV light… Using sun to destilling is easy, but ned a quit big construction,, and its difficult to make sure no bacterias or virus spreads from dirty part to clean part.. a lot of sunlight will also desinfect, but in a long turn you will have the problem with algaes, and then the sun desinfect effect is lost.. Using a mirror system to make the heat more intens is better, but is also a large construktion.. boiling is the preferd way since its easyest to doo, and is understod by the masses..
Monotreme – at 00:27
Just wanted to commend you on the excellent job you did on the “Public Water Supply” portion of the FluWiki. Since this is such an important topic I suspect this portion of the website will continue to grow.
Thanks, Okieman. I have a new appreciation of the importance and fragility of our water supply. Hope this thread and that page provide useful information for both the producers and users of clean water.
Fla_Medic – at 06:48 “2. Boiling and capturing/condensing steam” --- THAT’S distilling. You’re right that it is energy intensive, but nearly everything boils out, as long as it’s not a ‘closed’ system, ie. sealed on both ends in order to capture ALL the steam. The delivery end of the capture coil should remain open into the drain vessel. Also, once a person has distilled water and let it cool, one of the best and easiest ways to get some taste back into it is to pour the water back and forth between two containers for about 5 minutes. This re-oxygenates the water….basically put the O back in the H2O!!
We have a page for gadgets here: http://www.fluwikie.com/index.php?n=Brainstorming.ResilienceTechnology
I know some people just love this so much that we’ll be able to harvest a good bunch of links.
Monotreme, you say you “will look at the personal preps page next”. Perhaps we could share the load? You direct us to things you’d do (specific work or general areas or whatever) and we lend a hand or two? What do you imagine as the final “product” to be, after a few more days?
What do others think about the “water” subject?
Thanks!
lugon: The first thing I want to do is look at the organization and work on links between a water section on the Personal Preps page and the Public Water page. After I do that, I’ll probably have more questions, which I will post here.
Just out of interest, does anybody know the stats on water supplies in the U.S., specifically, how many people get their supplies from each of the following categories:
1. muni: open reservoir fed 2. muni: river fed 3. muni: lake fed 4. muni: groundwater fed 5. personal:groundwater/well 6. others?
I tried to find these data but I don’t even know where to start. google searches were unsuccessful
Same for Europe and other parts of the World?
Michael Donnelly - You will find some of the information you asked for if you will go to this link:
http://www.epa.gov/OGWDW/pws/factoids.html
Started looking for it last evening but got sidetracked. I’ll see if I can find the rest of the data, but I think it will be a bit harder to find (i.e. domestic personal wells).
Michael Donnelly - This link has the percentage of people in the U.S. that use domestic (private) wells as a drinking water source. (That didn’t take as long as I thought. Maybe I’ll be back in a little while with more;-)
Michael Donnelly - And here is some more. This is probably the most comprehensive, but still not quite the break down that you describe up above. EPA and the various state primacy agencies generally only break this type of data out as “surface water” or “ground water”. Hope this helps you out.
http://www.epa.gov/safewater/data/pdfs/data_factoids_2004.pdf
A couple diverse points.
1. Water utility employees who need to be included: Those who maintain dams and reservoirs, who are often at a great distance from where the water is used. (e.g.: Most of NYC’s water comes from reservoirs in the Catskills.)
2. Another possible emergency water source: Private commercial wells, especially those run by bottled water companies, which already have the facilities to maintain purity. If local authorities helped/subsidized provision of generators to keep these going during power outages, they’d likely find cooperation from the companies in providing emergency supplies.
I just discovered this site and thread and know very little about bird flu transmission and water purification for viruses. We already drink rainwater collected from our roof into a cistern and purify it with chlorine and a pitcher filter system (PUR) and it currently tests out well. However, wild birds are often near or in our gutters and there is no way to definitely insure that our roof is not contaminated with bird feces before collecting the water. It seems to me that most rainwater collection methods would be vulnerable to this problem. Is direct contamination by wild birds into rainwater used for drinking thought to be a possible means of transmitting bird flu? We are quite concerned about our own water supply and wonder how to make sure that we can purify both drinking and other water for our household—we only have access to city water through water hauling and this might not be possible during a pandemic. What is the best method for purifying against viruses in this situation? It seems to me that all household water including shower water would need purification.
Hmm - I tried to post something regarding “rainwater harvest” (google for that) and rejecting the first “wash” of your roof.
Wow. All of this in only 7 days? Shall we push this a bit further? How do we contact people in charge, bloggers, activists, etc, so they get the ball rolling around this specific issue? Flu and Water Awareness Week? Flu-waw anyone?
Or do we move to the next exercise (which would be, ugh, “power” - as in “electricity, fuel, etc”)?
Before we leave this subject, I suggest we read what’s written and jot down some notes on “what’s missing”. We may not actually solve it, but we will remember there was something left in our “to do” list.
TO DO LIST
Notes on “what’s missing”:
So let’s comb Consequences.WaterSupply? for “missing stuff”.
Uh - looks like work!
I think the “Water Supply” main page is “ready for consumption”. I feel we need to consolidate the above pages into the main structure. Needs energy, or perhaps someone can see manageable subtasks?
Let’s give this a week and make it “perfect”?
Very good information concerning disinfection of drinking water. Info about using both chlorine (sodium hypochlorite) and iodine. Breaks it down concerning amounts to use for both “clear” water and “cloudy” water.
Here is some more info concerning process public water systems must go through in Oklahoma when loss of pressure occurs.
http://www.deq.state.ok.us/factsheets/water/wateremergency.pdf
So, Consequences.WaterSupply? + Main.TourLevelI? + Consequences.Explaining3Flues? + Consequences.PandemicWaveInASpreadsheet? may all be useful when we finally aproach the “water experts” locally. (Use the “print” option wisely!)
We can then share what the fluwikie community has cocreated so that the water experts will be able to do a few sensible things for our local communities.
Please keep us informed of what happens in practice when you aproach them! Maybe there’s need for more thinking (or clearer words) on our part? Maybe they can share their own ideas which could in turn help others?
Thanks to all involved!
Can runoff from asphalt shingles be used to water food plants? Or is it too toxic, as suggested on another thread by a poster who saw dogs die after drinking it?
If dogs died after drinking runoff from asphalt shingles they died from something other than the water. I don’t think it would hurt to water food plants with runoff from a house with asphalt shingles. What small amount of contaminants (and I think it would be small) that might come off this material would be diluted by the rain water. There might could be an issue with brand new shingles, but shingles that had been there for some time with multiple rains falling on them should be ok. If this sort of thing was very toxic we all would have heard about it I would think.
I’m not sure if this is the right place to post this issue/question…It’s been on my mind…
If the electricity were to be out for an extended period of time, won’t there be problems with the sewage pumping systems?
The way I understand it, waste water is largely a gravity fed system, but because not all communities are in a perfect basin, at certain points the waste water is pumped uphill to reach the waste water treatment plant. Great. Except when the electricity is out, and the backup generator starts running low…
When I bought insurance for my house, I got the sewer rider for this type of back-up. I understand that one can have a plumber install a one-way flow device in the line (which is expensive, but I’m considering it…)
But would it really matter if there is sewer from the manholes flowing down the street or the neighbor’s house.
Wouldn’t this be the ultimate public health problem?
I’m surprised as I’ve read these forums for the past 3months that the issue of “back-up” sewage has not been discussed more. Being on a septic system with plans to have it pumped this early summer, I’m not overly concerned about our ability to get through, but when sewage plants shut down 2 things can happen if I understood from the field trip I took my class on there last spring….. either they back up from their point, “upstream” or else it’s just flushed all through usually to a body of water like a river (they’ll do this during times of exceedingly heavy rainfalls when the input cannot be handled… getting it there may be an issue as amt points out.. not everyone is “uphill” from the plant and there are pumps along the way to get it from houses to the plant……I’ll be asking again when we revist in May, until then does anyone have an answer for this?
I agree with amt… this could be the ultimate public health problem when the pandmic hits and certain services become comprimised.
amt - Your are correct that many wastewater systems require electricity to operate the lift stations, which pump sewage to the wasterwater treatment plant. No electricity means the sewage would begin to backup in these systems. Many systems have backup generators for the lift stations, but keeping them fueled would possibly be an issue.
As to whether this would be the ultimate health problem - the pandemic would be the gravest threat - but the lack of sewage service and/or water service would compound the problem making a horrible situation even more so. This is why I believe that electric, water, and wastewater personnel should be placed right up there with health personnel and first responders to receive antivirals, vaccines, and emergency preparedness funding. The health personnel can not do their job very long if the electricity, water and wastewater is not functioning. These four groups of people are the most important to sustain in the event of a long term emergency. Everything else will fall apart if this does not happen.
I am blessed in that I have a district water company and septic. I am a year or two away from needing pumping, but plan to do it this spring along with having the furnace serviced and the fireplace chimney cleaned (it has a heatolator). I sat on the Water district’s board a few years ago and plan to review what they are doing for a contingency plan. We are set up into four sub areas with 16 wells that serve the district and connecting pipelines to serve another area if needed. Also about 10 monitoring wells to guard against salt water intrusion. The aquifer that serves me has extremely good quality water. I have no plans to filter it, but I do have some bottled water as a back up, and I bought 3 containers from a camping/outdoors place that will hold 27 gallons of water as a further backup.
In my county, there is a high degree of cooperation between first responders and water districts. they work together on disaster planning and tabletop exercises. Time for me to take the executive director of the district to lunch..
You can ask for a copy of their latest water quality report to see what is there. You might check on line as well for a published disaster plan
Here’s a probably dumb question. Assuming that the water coming out of your tap is questionable and that you are not using it, wouldn’t it still be OK to run the diswasher if you put in some bleach or something during the last rinse cycle?
amt at 22:19, yes, there are backflow preventer valves that can be installed in your main sewage pipe. Although in most communities you’re probably supposed to have a plumber install one, you CAN install one yourself. We did that, and I’ve gotta say it was probably one of the easier plumbing jobs we ever did. It is a matter of locating the sewer pipe as it leaves your home, PAST any feeder lines or floor drain, digging (or jackhammering, if under a concrete floor) to expose the line, cutting the line with a saws-all and inserting the backflow valve, and ensuring that the backflow valve has access for maintenance before you backfill your hole. Entire cost to us was about $120, but a plumber wanted over $2,000 to do it. Took us 2 days to do it (one day to locate the pipe and dig the hole to expose the pipe, then a 2nd day to cut the pipe, insert the valve, and backfill. Make plans ahead of time, because from the time you actually cut the pipe until the time you have the backflow valve actually hooked up (for us about a 1 hour time period), you won’t be able to run any water (flushing, any water into any drains).
So, to keep this “exercise” focused - what would be the advice we should give to those in charge? Where does it go? Not in Consequences.WaterSupply? but … Consequences.AnticipatedProblems? … http://www.fluwikie.com/index.php?n=Consequences.AnticipatedProblems#sewage … There’s a Consequences.Sewagetreatment? waiting to be filled in! It’s as easy as copying all the stuff from the above messages - do it as raw text first! - then add an outline at the beginning of the page - then reshuffle text until it makes sense.
Anyone can do it, please!
(I could do it myself but I’m also doing other things.)
I’ve just started Consequences.LetterToWaterSupplyPeople?, which needs some more work as of this writing.
You’re still invited to work on Consequences.Sewagetreatment? ;)
Together we can do quite a few things.
WELL - Resource Centre Network for Water, Sanitation and Environmental Health
Basically everything you could possibly want to know about water and waste ;-)
Technical Briefs
Originally published individually in ‘Waterlines’, the world’s only magazine devoted entirely to low-cost water and sanitation, these highly illustrated technical briefs bring together a body of information and guidance which has already proved of great practical help to agencies and fieldworkers.
The collection is available here in pdf format and in print as Running Water, published by ITDG Publishing in association with WELL and available from WEDC. Running Water complements The Worth of Water, the first collection of briefs (nos. 1 to 32).
Prepared by Rod Shaw, Design and Production Editor of WEDC publications, in association with leading authors in the field, each short brief concludes with useful sources of further information. Ian Smout, Director of WEDC sets the scene for programme and project workers who will find this collection as invaluable as the first.
Buried and semi-submerged water tanks - Brief 56
Choosing an appropriate technology - Brief 49
Discharge measurements and estimates - Brief 27
Emergency sanitation for refugees - Brief 38
Emergency water supply - Brief 44
Emergency water supply in cold regions - Brief 62
Emptying latrine pits - Brief 54
Ferrocement water tanks - Brief 36
Household water treatment 1 - Brief 58
Household water treatment 2 - Brief 59
Improving pond water - Brief 47
Latrine slabs and seats - Brief 45
Low-lift irrigation pumps - Brief 35
Maintaining handpumps - Brief 33
On-plot sanitation in urban areas - Brief 61
Protecting springs - an alternative to spring boxes - Brief 34
Re-use of wastewater - Brief 37
Simple drilling methods - Brief 43
Small-scale irrigation design - Brief 42
Surface water drainage - how evaluation can improve performance - Brief 57
Upgrading traditional wells - Brief 39
Wastewater treatment options - Brief 64
Water clarification using Moringa oleifera seed coagulent - Brief 60
Water - quality or quantity? - Brief 52
Now the Cooperative Thinking Exercises index page is on the other server. We’re starting an exercise about “food”.
Ok here we go the State of Florida just came out with it’s disaster plan for 2006. Since it gets 3 or 4 major storms each year (it is a plan worth looking at). Water is a big change this year with the amount moving from 1 to 3 gallons per person per day. Katerina anyone!
I was in the military for 20 years mainly in the desert and Okinawa, which have no water supplies. You have to change your way of thinking of how it is used. Can you use the same water two or even three? Thw answer is yes. We use to brush our teeth, take a wash cloth bath, then wash and rinse our clothes in it. Then we could use the waste water to clean equipment. All with the same 1/2 gallon of water.
In Okinawa; which must survive on rain water. water management has been raised to a fine art. We need a good contact with their local government to get ideas from.
I just had an idea how to warn the public if, for some reason, the water was not safe to drink. Put a harmless dye in the system. There are water tracer dyes like rhodamine, fluorescein, and others that have been used to trace leaks and stuff for years, and a few are approved for water systems. If the water looks ok, assume it is ok, if the water is pink or blue or orange, then you have to boil or otherwise treat it for drinking. Easy to stockpile dye.
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I thought this was an interesting concept. I think the WAPI (water pasteurization indicator) is a tube that has mostly beeswax and some small amount of carnuba mixed in it. When it stays melted for 6 min your water is pasturized, either in a solar cooker or a solar puddle.
solar puddle [http://solarcooking.org/puddle.htm]
Closed due to length. Conversation is continued here.