In Australia, remote and regional communities frequently manage relatively small, isolated water treatment and waste management systems which have water quality and health risks characteristic of small-scale decentralised operations…
Although a cluster of customer complaints can identify specific water quality issues such as a dirty water event, it is more difficult to understand the extent of general customer satisfaction with water quality and taste…
The ADWG prioritises the removal of microscopic pathogens (and the toxins some produce) from public drinking water supplies to prevent large scale outbreaks of illness…
Water treatment plants (WTP) take in source waters then remove 95-99% of blue-green algae (cyanobacteria) cells and the toxins they produce…
The ADWG has methods for predicting risks to water quality, but these were not developed for managing extreme climate-change driven weather events such as bushfires or floods…
Water treatment plant operators remove cyanobacteria and the toxins they produce from source waters but calculating the amount of treatment needed for effective removal is difficult, particularly in bloom conditions when cyanobacterial cell numbers and toxins change quickly…
Blue-green algae (cyanobacteria) reduce water quality especially when they bloom and form high numbers of cells which produce toxins, and taste and odour compounds…
Blue-green algae (cyanobacteria) blooms decrease water quality by releasing toxins and unpalatable taste and odour compounds…
Source waters are disinfected to remove harmful pathogens, but chlorine reacts with organic matter and bromides to form disinfection by-products (DBPs) which can affect health…
Components of dissolved organic matter (DOM) and dissolved organic nitrogen (DON) in source waters can react with disinfecting chlorine or chloramine to form nitrogenous disinfection byproducts (n-DBPs) which might be toxic and hazardous to health…