Melbourne Water is the bulk water supplier for the City of Melbourne, Australia. Much
of the city's drinking water supply is drawn from protected, uninhabited catchments
and delivered to consumers disinfected but unfiltered.
After many years of drought, severe storms in catchment areas in mid-2007 resulted
in a water quality incident with high raw water turbidity levels from wash-off into
reservoirs. A boil water notice was issued for small townships that received drinking
water directly from the affected reservoir (Upper Yarra Reservoir).
Melbourne Water has a certified risk management plan for drinking water quality
(HACCP, ISO 9001, ISO14001) that requires research to be undertaken in areas of
the water supply where risks are not fully understood or identified. Several years of
research into the presence of Cryptosporidium in catchment animals, combined with
detailed risk assessments and event-based sampling in catchment areas has shown
that the risk of contamination of the water supply with human-infectious
Cryptosporidium is low.
Research results, combined with a quantitative microbial risk assessment and results
of genotyping of Cryptosporidium in water samples during the incident was presented
to the Victorian Department of Human Services, who determined that the risk of
human infectious Cryptosporidium to the consumers of Melbourne's drinking water
was acceptable. As a result, a boil water notice for Melbourne was not issued. This
experience highlighted the importance of rigorous risk assessment and research to
support water supply management decisions. Includes 7 references, tables, figures.
| Edition : | Vol. - No. |
| File Size : | 1
file
, 740 KB |
| Note : | This product is unavailable in Ukraine, Russia, Belarus |
| Number of Pages : | 9 |
| Published : | 11/01/2008 |
