MWRA - Drinking Water Test Results 2021

While the pandemic continued to impact health and supply lines in 2021, MWRA’s drinking water continued to meet all federal and state standards. MWRA staff carried out ongoing, uninterrupted treatment, sampling, testing, planning, and monitoring to ensure the continuous delivery of pure drinking water to all our customers. This annual water quality report illustrates MWRA’s ongoing efforts to ensure the provision of your water under all conditions.

At the Water Source…
MWRA works with your community, the Department of Conservation and Recreation (DCR), and state and federal regulators to continuously evaluate your drinking water. From the reservoirs surrounded by forests and wetlands, through treatment and miles of pipelines, to your drinking water faucet. MWRA’s laboratories conduct hundreds of thousands of tests on the water you receive every year for over 120 potential contaminants.

MWRA’s work to protect the drinking water at your home or business starts with our two pristine reservoirs in central Massachusetts — the Quabbin Reservoir, 65 miles from Boston, and the Wachusett Reservoir, 35 miles from Boston. Combined, these two connected reservoirs provide an average of 200 million gallons of pure, highly protected, high quality water each day to 53 communities. The Ware River provides additional water when needed.

The Quabbin and Wachusett watersheds—areas that drain water to the reservoirs—are naturally protected. More than 85% of the watersheds are covered with forests and wetlands, which filter the rain and snow that enters the streams that flow to the reservoirs. This water comes in contact with soil, rock, plants, and other material as it follows its natural path to the reservoirs. This process helps to clean the water, but it also can dissolve and carry very small amounts of material into the reservoir. Minerals and rock do not typically cause problems in the water. Water can also transport contaminants, including bacteria, viruses or other potential pathogens, from human and animal activity, that can cause illness. Testing results show few contaminants are found in the reservoir water. The few that are detected are in very small amounts that are well below EPA’s standards.

MWRA and DCR maintain a nationally recognized watershed protection program. The Department of Environmental Protection’s (DEP) Source Water Assessment report for the Quabbin and Wachusett Reservoirs commended DCR and MWRA for our source water protection plans. The report states that our “watershed protection programs are very successful and greatly reduce the actual risk of contamination.” MWRA and DCR follow the report recommendations to maintain the pristine watershed areas. For more information on our source water, go to: www.mwra.com/sourcewater.html.

Testing to the Tap
MWRA analyzes, treats and protects the quality of your water from its source to your home or business, starting with the watershed streams, to hundreds of miles of MWRA pipes and thousands of miles of local pipes, all the way to your home. MWRA testing shows that few contaminants are found in the water from our reservoirs. All were well below EPA’s standards in 2021.

A key, initial test for reservoir water quality is turbidity, or cloudiness. Turbidity refers to the amount of suspended particles in the water and can impair water disinfection. All water must be below 5 NTU (nephelometric turbidity units), and water can only be above 1 NTU if it does not interfere with effective disinfection. In 2021, typical levels in the Wachusett Reservoir were 0.29 NTU, with the highest level of turbidity at 0.61 NTU, well below the standard.

MWRA also tests water for potential disease-causing organisms, including fecal coliform bacteria, and parasites such as Giardia and Cryptosporidium, that can enter the water from animal or human waste. All test results for the reservoir water were well within state and federal testing and treatment standards.

Learn more about MWRA testing for waterborne contaminants and their potential health impacts on our website at: www.mwra.com.

Treating Your Water
Water Downstream of the reservoirs, MWRA’s John J. Carroll Water Treatment Plant in Marlborough provides state-of-the-art treatment and monitoring of your water. Our well trained and licensed operators add measured doses of treatment chemicals.

Water Monitoring After Treatment
EPA and state regulations require regular monitoring of water quality tests to evaluate the water you drink. MWRA conducts hundreds of thousands of tests per year on over 120 contaminants. A complete list is available on www.mwra.com. The results of MWRA’s water quality tests in 2021 are shown in the table on page 2. They confirm the quality and safety of the water your community receives from MWRA.

Continuous Service + Redundancy = Reliability
Maintaining system redundancy allows us to continue uninterrupted water delivery to your community, even if sections of our system need inspection, repair or rehabilitation. Planning and environmental review for two new tunnels north and south of Boston to provide reliable service to the entire region is well underway. We also have major projects underway to rehabilitate the Weston Aqueduct Supply Main 3, a 60-inch pipe in Weston, Waltham, Belmont, Arlington and Medford, as well as a 48-inch pipe in Stoneham and Woburn. See www.mwra.com for more info.

MWRA provides zero–interest loans to communities for pipeline rehabilitation and other water quality improvements. During 2021, we loaned $28 million to 18 communities for pipeline projects and $11 million to 8 communities for lead service line replacements.

Monitoring All Day, Every Day
MWRA’s monitoring systems are in operation continuously, 24/7/365. The systems help us evaluate your water before and after treatment. They also help us determine if the water is free of contaminants, and to respond rapidly to changes or issues related to water quality.

Lead can be found in your home, including plumbing and your drinking water. Learn about the health impacts of lead, and how to reduce exposure to this toxic metal on the following pages.

How Lead Affects Health and Development
Lead affects young children, and may cause damage to the brain, slow growth and development, and learning and behavior problems. Preventing lead exposure is particularly important if a pregnant woman or a child lives in your home or apartment. Lead can also impact the health of your entire family. While lead poisoning frequently comes from exposure to lead paint dust or chips, lead in drinking water can also contribute to chronic, total lead exposure

Important Lead Information From EPA
If present, elevated levels of lead can cause serious health problems, especially for pregnant women and young children. Lead in drinking water comes primarily from materials and components associated with service lines and home plumbing. MWRA is responsible for providing high quality drinking water, but cannot control the variety of materials used in plumbing components. If your water has been sitting for several hours, you can minimize the potential for lead exposure by flushing your tap for 30 seconds to 2 minutes before using water for drinking or cooking. If you are concerned about lead in your water, you may wish to have your water tested. Information on lead in drinking water, testing methods, and steps you can take to minimize exposure is available from the Safe Drinking Water Hotline at 1-800-426-4791 or www.epa.gov/safewater/lead.

How Lead Can Enter Your Water
Lead in your home plumbing or a lead service line can contribute to elevated lead levels in the water you drink. MWRA’s water is lead-free when it leaves our reservoirs. Distribution pipes that carry the water to your community are made mostly of iron and steel, and do not add lead to the water. Lead can enter your tap water from your service line (the line that connects your home to the water main) if it is made of lead, lead solder used in plumbing, or from some older faucets.

Corrosion, or wearing away of lead-based materials can add lead to tap water, especially if water sits for a long time in the pipes before it is used. MWRA’s corrosion control program helps limit the amount of lead in your water. In 1996, MWRA began adding sodium carbonate and carbon dioxide to adjust the water’s pH and buffering capacity. This treatment makes the water less corrosive and reduces leaching of lead into drinking water. Lead levels found in sample tests of tap water have dropped by nearly 90% since this treatment change. Learn more about lead in drinking water at www.mwra.com.

MWRA Meets Lead Standard in 2021
Under EPA/DEP rules, MWRA and your local water department are required to test tap water each year. We collect samples from homes with lead service lines or lead solder. The EPA rule requires that 9 out of 10 homes tested must have lead levels below the Action Level of 15 parts per billion (ppb).

This testing process can provide information on whether lead is corroding and mixing with the drinking water. It also provides communities and homeowners with information on how to reduce lead in their drinking water. The results do not reflect lead levels in all homes.

All sampling rounds over the past 18 years have been below the EPA Action Level. Nine out of ten homes were below 8.56 ppb—well below the Action Level.

Five communities—Boston, Malden, Medford, Melrose and Winthrop—were above the lead Action Level in September 2021. Your community letter will provide you with local results and more information.

Lead Service Lines
A service line connects your home or building to the water main in the street. If yours is made of lead, it can be the main source of lead in your tap water. Older pipes that combined galvanized iron and lead connectors (“goosenecks”) can also release lead. Lead services lines should be removed entirely to prevent lead in your drinking water.

Replacing Lead Service Lines
Your local water department can help find out if you have a lead service line, and provide help in replacing it. In some cases, an onsite check is necessary to determine the specific piping to your building.

You can also see if your service line is made of lead by scratching the pipe near your water meter with a key or other metal object. Lead pipes will show a dull grey color, while copper pipes will not. For an online how-to guide, go to www.epa.gov/pyt.

MWRA Funding to Replace Lead Service Lines
MWRA and its Advisory Board offer zero-interest loans to customer communities for full lead service line replacement projects. Each MWRA community can develop its own local plan, and many communities have already taken steps to remove lead service lines. To find out more, contact your local water department.

Remove Lead Piping
Find out if you have a lead service line or lead components in your plumbing. Learn about options for removal of this piping from your local water department.

Other Measures for Lead Reduction

How to Test Your Drinking Water
If you are concerned about lead piping in your home, contact your local water department about testing for lead in your drinking water. MWRA also maintains a list of certified laboratories and sampling instructions on our website at www.mwra.com. You may also call MWRA at 617-242-5323.

Lead Testing in Schools
Children can consume most of their drinking water at school or daycare. The plumbing inside some schools and childcare facilities can contain lead and contribute to lead exposure. MWRA, in coordination with DEP, provides no-cost lab analysis and technical assistance for schools and day care centers in MWRA communities. This service has been offered since 2016, and nearly all MWRA communities have participated. To date, more than 39,000 tests have been completed in more than 530 schools. Results are available on the MassDEP website at: www.mass.gov/dep (search for “lead in schools”). You may also contact your local school or water department for results.

MWRA works with local water departments to sample and test 300-500 water samples each week for total coliform bacteria. Total coliform bacteria can come from the intestines of warm blooded animals, or can be found in soil, plants, or other places. Most of the time, they are not harmful. However, their presence could signal that harmful bacteria from fecal waste may be there as well. If total coliform is detected in more than 5% of samples in a month, the water system is required to investigate the possible source and fix any identified problems. If a water sample does test positive, we run a more specific test for E. coli, which is a bacteria found in human and animal fecal waste and may cause illness. If your community was required to do an investigation, or found E. coli, it will be in the letter from your community.

Important Research for New Regulations
MWRA works with EPA and health research organizations to help define new national drinking water standards by collecting data on water contaminants that are not yet regulated. Very few of these potential contaminants are found in MWRA water due to our source water protection efforts. Information on this testing, as well as data on PFAS, disinfection by-products, Giardia and Cryptosporidium, and other contaminants can be found at www.mwra.com.

MWRA Monitoring for PFAS
PFAS compounds, used since the 1950s for many purposes from stain and water proofing to firefighting, continue to be a concern. In 2020, MassDEP published a drinking water standard for PFAS. MWRA water is now tested for 6 different PFAS compounds or “PFAS6.” Tests of MWRA water show only trace amounts of these compounds, well below the state standard of 20 parts per trillion. See www.mwra.com.

Important Health Information: Drinking Water and People with Weakened Immune Systems

Some people may be more vulnerable to contaminants in drinking water than the general population. Immuno-compromised persons such as persons with cancer undergoing chemotherapy, persons who have undergone organ transplants, people with HIV/AIDS or other immune system disorders, some elderly, and infants, can be particularly at risk from infections. These people should seek advice about drinking water from their health care providers. EPA/CDC guidelines on appropriate means to lessen the risk of infection by Cryptosporidium and other microbial contaminants are available from the EPA’s Safe Drinking Water Hotline (1-800-426-4791).

Drinking water, including bottled water, may reasonably be expected to contain at least small amounts of some contaminants. The presence of contaminants does not necessarily indicate that water poses a health risk. More information about contaminants and potential health effects can be obtained by calling the EPA’s Safe Drinking Water Hotline (1-800-426-4791) or MWRA. In order to ensure that tap water is safe to drink, the Massachusetts DEP and the EPA prescribe regulations which limit the amount of certain contaminants in water provided by public water systems. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and the Massachusetts Department of Public Health (MDPH) regulations establish limits for contaminants in bottled water, which must provide the same protection for public health.

Cross-Connection Information
A cross-connection is any temporary or permanent connection between a potable (drinking) water source and a non-potable source. Non-potable water or other sources can contaminate your drinking water if backflow occurs.

Massachusetts DEP recommends the installation of backflow prevention devices for inside and outside hose connections to help protect the water in your home as well as the drinking water system in your town. For more information on cross-connections, please call 617-242-5323 or visit www.mwra.com.

Continue to Conserve
MWRA water use has dropped by over a third since the 1980s. It’s up to all of us to continue to use water wisely. Every drop is valuable. Our website has many tips on how to save water indoors and outside.

Your Community Letter:

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Town of Winthrop
Department of Public Works
100 Kennedy Drive, Winthrop, MA 02152

Public Water Supply
# 3346000

The Winthrop Department of Public Works is pleased to provide this annual water quality report to keep you informed about our water distribution system. Winthrop purchases all of its water directly from the MWRA. We are happy to have a partnership with the MWRA in our mission to supply some of the best quality water in the country. This water is delivered through a master meter and the pressure is
regulated at the town’s pressure reducing station before being conveyed through the network of buried water main and ultimately to your home or business.

Meter Replacement Program: In an effort to enhance meter reading productivity and customer service, Winthrop has converted to a radio read system and continues to work on a town-wide meter replacement project which is approximately 85% complete. This initiative will help reduce unaccounted for water and enhance customer support capabilities.

Leak Detection and Hydrant Flushing: Winthrop conducts an annual leak detection survey to help locate leaks and to reduce unaccounted for water. The survey was completed in October and identified 5 service leaks and 1 valve leak. All leaks were promptly repaired. We continued our 15-phase unidirectional flushing program, that helps maintain water quality by removing naturally occurring sediments in the water mains that can cause taste, odor, and turbidity problems. This program also exercises gate valves and inspects and tests hydrants to assure adequate fire protection. Two phases of this program were completed in 2021.

Water System Maintenance: The DPW Water Division is responsible for operating and maintaining the Pressure Reducing Station, 46 miles of buried water main, a 1 Million gallon capacity stand-pipe, 500 fire hydrants and 4,500 service connections. In 2021 the Water Division repaired 8 water main breaks and 108 lead services were relayed with copper, 25 by in-house staff and 83 as part of an MWRA funded project. The division also replaced 7 fire hydrants and repaired 4 more. The Town has also completed the water main replacement phase of a major infrastructure replacement project in the Center Business District that included the replacement and upgrade of all water mains, valves, and services in that area. This full project, including street and sidewalk restoration affected by the utility work is scheduled to be completed in June of 2022. Winthrop continues to enforce the DEP mandated cross connection control and prevention program to prevent contamination from entering our distribution system. In 2021, the department conducted 100 backflow prevention device tests.
Lead in your water: The Department of Public Works is committed to reducing lead in our water distribution system and is actively monitoring for lead and copper in compliance with the MassDEP Lead and Copper Rule. The Action Level for lead is 15 ppb. During the September 2021 sampling round, Winthrop exceeded the lead action level with a 90th percentile result of 27.6 ppb. The 90th percentile for copper was 189 ppb, below the Action Level of 1300 ppb. We care about lead because children who drink water containing lead in excess of the action level could experience delays in their physical or mental development. Children could show slight deficits in attention
span and learning abilities. Adults who drink this water over many years could develop kidney problems or high blood pressure. As a result, Winthrop will be required to sample two times in 2022, in March and September. Winthrop DPW has taken the following steps to address lead and copper: 1) Completely identified the remaining lead services; 2) Continued our program to remove 7% of the Town
owned portion of the remaining lead services; and 3) Committed to making lead line replacement a priority in planning future water main replacement projects. In the Spring of 2022, Winthrop was required to carry out an additional round of lead sampling. The 90th percentile was 11.5 ppb, well below the lead Action Level.

Property owners with existing lead services, who wish to participate in the lead removal program, or want further details, are encouraged to call the DPW at 617-846-1341 or email scalla@town.winthrop.ma.us. We urge owners of older homes and buildings to inspect their plumbing and, if possible, replace fittings that have lead joints or lead solder. We also encourage you to review the information contained in this report to take practical steps to reduce exposure to lead and other common contaminants.

Total Coliform Tests in Community Pipes: The Winthrop Water Department tests 12 samples twice per month for total coliform bacteria to monitor the distribution system. The EPA requires that no more than 5% of the samples in a month may be positive. Coliforms are bacteria that are naturally present in the environment and are used as an indicator that other, potentially harmful, waterborne pathogens may be present or that a potential pathway exists through which contamination may enter the drinking water distribution system. We found coliforms indicating the need to look for potential problems in water treatment or distribution. Winthrop exceeded this requirement 4 times from July to December of 2021 at multiple sample sites, which resulted in Level 2 Assessments for each occurrence. A Level 2 Assessment is a study of the water system to identify potential problems and determine (if possible) why total coliform bacteria have been found in our water system. All assessments were completed and submitted to DEP. We reported to DEP that the cause of the exceedances was suspected to be temperature related in conjunction with poor turn-over of the water within the stand-pipe which was resulting in the depletion of adequate chlorine residual in the tank and in several areas throughout the distribution system. As a result, the tank was completely drained, cleaned, inspected, and re-chlorinated prior to re-activation. We also did a town-wide flushing program to eliminate aged water situations and replenish adequate chlorine residuals.

We truly hope you find this report useful and informative. If you would like more info regarding public meetings, feel free to contact the Winthrop DPW, the MWRA, or other contacts such as the DEP or EPA as listed herein.

Sincerely, Steven R. Calla

Public Works Director / Water Superintendent