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Now we will discuss the Safe Drinking Water Act.
The Safe Drinking Water Act was promulgated in 1974. It was established by the Environmental Protection Agency.
The Environmental Protection Agency is a federal agency the covers all 50 states and 5 territories.
The Safe Drinking Water Act is the main federal law that insures quality water for most Americans.
Under the Safe Drinking Water Act, EPA sets standards for drinking water quality
and oversees the states, local municpalities and other water suppliers who implement their standards.
Which glass would you want to drink from?
The Safe Drinking Water Act was originally passed, as we said, by Congress in 1974.
The law was amended in 1986. The first major amendment made it mandatory for all public water systems to disinfect their water.
The purpose of disinfection is to destroy those disease causing organisms.
In 1996, the second major amendment dealt with, first of all, operator certification
in which all public water systems must employ certified operators to insure the quality of the water.
On another point from the 1996 amendments that we see was no longer all public water systems to disinfect
but to disinfect as necessary.
For some groundwater systems it became no longer a necessity for disinfection.
The Safe Drinking Water Act sets the standards, minimum standards, for naturally occurring health standards as well as
those manmade contaminates that may be found in the drinking water
such as total coliform bacteria to name one. Lead, copper, arsenic.
So we have inorganics, we have organics, we have synthetic organics
and they will set the maximum contaminate level as well as the maximum contaminate level goal.
The maximum contaminate level is that level in which a known health risk is associated when exceeding the level that's set by EPA.
The maximum contaminate level goal is that level in which no known health effect will occur.
EPA, the states, and water systems then work together to make sure those standards are met.
Now millions of Americans receive quality drinking water every day from their public water systems.
Now these can be privately owned or publicly owned,
privately operated, publicly operated.
Nevertheless, drinking water safety cannot be taken for granted.
That is the reason why we have the standard.
The Safe Drinking Water Act applies to every public water system in the United States.
There are currently more than 160,000 public water systems providing water to most Americans at sometime in their lives.
And so a number of these systems are regulated under the Safe Drinking Water Act.
As you can see, all the types of pollutants that will affect our drinking water.
We have point source, we have non-point source.
So the Safe Drinking Water Act is in place to make sure that you and I on a daily basis have safe drinking water that we can consume.