The City of Boulder operates two water treatment plants: the Betasso WTP which treats
water from Silver Lake and Barker Reservoir, and the Boulder Reservoir WTP which
treats water from the Boulder Feeder Canal (BFC) and Boulder Reservoir. The City's
long-term strategy for drinking water production is to baseload the Boulder Reservoir
WTP at its production capacity to reduce reliance on the higher-cost water that supplies
the Betasso WTP. This will place added stress on the operation of the Boulder Reservoir
WTP to meet water quality and quantity objectives, and place more importance on the
source water quality received at the Reservoir WTP
The City of Boulder Open Space and Real Estate and the Boulder County Open Space
offices have proposed to open a recreational trail adjacent to the BFC along its entire
length. New sources of contamination can be introduced into the BFC as a result of trail
activities, degrading the quality of water received by the Reservoir WTP. The Boulder
Reservoir WTP will need to meet the treatment challenges posed by its future operation
as a baseload facility and the likely degradation in water quality due to trail development
along the BFC. A critical question is whether the Boulder Reservoir WTP is sufficiently
robust to meet these future water quality and treatment challenges.
Protecting public health from pathogenic organisms is the "critical mission" of public
water supplies like the City of Boulder Water Department. Understanding source water
vulnerability to pathogens will inform the City about the current success of- and need for
source water protection measures. The objective of this study included an assessment of
the existing and future source water vulnerability levels for the Boulder Reservoir and the
Boulder Feeder Canal specifically with respect to pathogen load increases that could be
expected with the development of a trail along the BFC.
Includes tables, figures.
| Edition : | Vol. - No. |
| File Size : | 1
file
, 530 KB |
| Note : | This product is unavailable in Ukraine, Russia, Belarus |
| Number of Pages : | 11 |
| Published : | 11/01/2002 |
