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City Looks At Options To Remove Arsenic From Water
by: John Larson
For The Mountain Mail
Contact: mountainmailreporter@gmail.com
SOCORRO – Water rates may be going up if a filtration plant has to be built to remove arsenic from the city’s water.
Mayor Ravi Bhasker told the Socorro City Council on Monday that the city has been in non-compliance with the Environmental Protection Agency’s arsenic standards for the last four years, ever since the agency lowered acceptable levels from 50 parts per billion to 10 parts per billion.
Bhasker said he has received official notification from the state Environmental Department that the city is in violation of the EPA’s safe drinking water standards.
“The whole Rocky Mountain region is affected by their ruling,” Bhasker said. “There are high levels of arsenic all over the West, more so than other parts of the country.”
Utilities Director Jay Santillanes said many communities in the state are facing the problem.
“Sandia National Labs ha been testing filter media for arsenic for the last three years,” Santillanes said. “There are a lot of areas up and down Rio Grande valley with this same problem.”
The minimum contamination level of arsenic in drinking water was lowered four years ago. The deadline for compliance was July 1, 2007.
Santillanes said it will cost the city anywhere from $200,000 to $600,000 a year to remove arsenic from the water coming from Socorro Springs, the main source for drinking water in Socorro.
Since the EPA ruling, there has been a debate around how safe, or unsafe, the level of arsenic in Socorro Springs is.
“People have been drinking water from the springs ever since people lived here, going back to the original settlement,” Santillanes said Wednesday. “Old timers will tell you there was a time when the springs flowed right into town, running down Spring Street.”
He said they city will have three or four options.
“One alternative is to build a treatment plant to remove the arsenic. That could cost up to a million dollars to build, plus several hundred thousand a year to operate,” he said.
“Another alternative is to take the springs offline, and make up the difference with the new Evergreen Well. It could maintain the capacity, but we would have to start looking for a new well. One with low arsenic levels.”
Santillanes said the Evergreen Well is below the minimum contamination level.
“The next problem is the industrial park well, which is above the MCL, at 18 parts per billion,” he said. “That well serves the industrial park area, including the hospital and the National Guard armory, and other places.”
He said treatment for the industrial well would be less expensive because of the lower arsenic level.
“We have to show them a preliminary plan within 30 days of this letter,” he said.
Bhasker said a water rate increase will be inevitable.
In other business:
• Paula Mertz of the Socorro Public Library announced the summer reading program will begin June 2 and run through July. Bicycles will be offered as grand prizes.
• Santillanes told the council renovations of the municipal swimming pool are finished and the pool will officially open Saturday. |
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