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Water Security Initiative
About PDF Files
The Water Security (WS) initiative is a U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) program that addresses the risk of intentional contamination of drinking water distribution
systems. EPA established this initiative in response to Homeland Security Presidential Directive 9, under which the Agency must “develop robust, comprehensive, and fully
coordinated surveillance and monitoring systems, including international information, for…water quality that provides early detection and awareness of disease, pest, or poisonous
agents.”
EPA is implementing the WS initiative in three phases:
- Phase I: develop the conceptual design of a system for timely detection and appropriate response to drinking water contamination incidents to mitigate
public health and economic impacts;
- Phase II: test and demonstrate contamination warning systems through pilots at drinking water utilities and municipalities and make refinements to the
design as needed based upon pilot results; and
- Phase III: develop practical guidance and outreach to promote voluntary national adoption of effective and sustainable drinking water contamination
warning systems.
Each of these phases is further described in the following Quick Reference Guide.
Phase I
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Water Security Initiative System Architecture (PDF)
(151 pp, 2MB)
EPA 817-D-05-003, December 2005
This document, which refers to the Water Security Initiative by its previous name, WaterSentinel, provides more detail on WS contamination warning systems components and
design.
Phase II
EPA is currently implementing the first contamination warning system pilot in partnership with the City of Cincinnati at the Greater Cincinnati Water Works (GCWW). This pilot consists of all five monitoring and surveillance components (online water quality monitoring, sampling and analysis, enhanced security monitoring, consumer complaint surveillance, and public health surveillance) and a consequence management plan. Implementation of this pilot began in June 2006, and deployment of the pilot components was completed in July 2007. The next stages of this pilot include full operation and evaluation.
In April 2008, the Agency awarded funding for contamination warning system pilots in New York City and San Francisco. Pilot projects at up to two additional cities may be awarded later this year. These additional demonstration pilots were selected through a national competition. They will be three year projects carried out as cooperative agreements with the Agency.
- Event Detection System Challenge
- Do you have an event detection or anomaly detection tool? Do you have an innovative approach to time series analysis of highly variable data?
Well, here is your chance to put your tool to the test! The EPA will provide you with several months of drinking water quality and operational data from six water quality monitoring stations located throughout the country, and it’s your job to use that information to train your Event Detection System (EDS) to detect unusual water quality events (e.g., contamination) without excessive false alarms! In addition to the thrill of victory, the results of this challenge will be of great interest to water utilities seeking to implement a contamination warning system, and this challenge is a great way to learn more about the performance of your tool in this growing field ! If you are a developer of an EDS tool and wish to participate in the challenge, click the link below for more information.
- Cincinnati Pilot Post-Implementation System Status (PDF) (135 pp, 3M)
EPA 817-R-08-004, September 2008
This document describes the status of the Cincinnati drinking water contamination warning system pilot following the installation of all monitoring and surveillance components. It provides detailed information on enhancements in the areas of on-line water quality monitoring, contaminant sampling and analysis, enhanced security monitoring, consumer complaint surveillance, public health surveillance, and consequence management.
Phase III
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Interim Guidance on Planning for Contamination
Warning System Deployment (PDF) (123 pp, 882K)
EPA 817-R-07-002, May 2007
This document will assist drinking water utilities in planning for contamination warning system deployment based on the model developed under EPA's Water Security initiative
(formerly known as WaterSentinel). In particular, this document may aid respondents to an upcoming EPA Request for Applications (RFA). Under this RFA, the Agency would make
financial awards for drinking water utilities to implement and evaluate contamination warning system demonstration pilots. EPA anticipates issuing this RFA in June
2007.
- Interim Guidance on Developing an Operational Strategy for Contamination Warning Systems (PDF) (88 pp,1.6M)
EPA 817-R-08-002, September 2008
This document will assist drinking water utilities with the development of recommended standard operating procedures for day-to-day operations of the monitoring and surveillance components of a contamination warning system. The guidance emphasizes development of an operational strategy in a manner that integrates the components to provide a timely indication of a possible contamination incident in the
distribution system. A case study of the operational strategy developed for the Cincinnati contamination warning system pilot is presented.
- Interim Guidance on Developing Consequence Management Plans for
Drinking Water Utilities (PDF) (101 pp,3.4M)
EPA 817-R-08-001, September 2008
This document will assist drinking water utilities with the development of plans for responding to and recovering from a
contamination incident in the distribution system. Once a possible contamination incident has been identified by routine monitoring and surveillance components, the consequence management plan defines a
process for establishing the credibility of the suspected incident, the response actions that may be taken to minimize public health and economic consequences, and a strategy to restore the system to normal
operations. Example decision tree templates and corresponding action items are provided.
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