Wildfires can contaminate drinking water not only at sources but throughout treatment and distribution infrastructure. The Tubbs Fire in 2017 burned over 36,000 acres across Sonoma, Napa and Lake counties and revealed contamination risks beyond watersheds and reservoirs. In the aftermath utilities recognized that fire can sully water at treatment centers and within pipes. The Eaton and Palisades fires prompted warnings against drinking tap water due to known carcinogens even though major reservoirs remained largely untouched. A civil engineering professor from Indiana developed a playbook that utilities now use to detect, respond to, and mitigate wildfire-related water contamination.
It Took One of the States Biggest Blazes to Shed Light on How Wildfires Threaten Water, and How to Respond When the Eaton and Palisades fires ripped through Los Angeles and Ventura counties earlier this year, residents living in or near the burned communities were warned not to drink or cook with tap water because it was contaminated with known carcinogens; and yet, the actual reservoirs and water sources that serve the LA area were spared from the bulk of the blazes.
In past years, utilities would have looked at watersheds and reservoirs as the first place where contamination took place. Then the Tubbs Fire struck in 2017, burning more than 36,000 acres across Sonoma, Napa and Lake counties. In the aftermath of that blaze, utilities learned that fire itself can sully clean water not just at the source, but at points of distribution, from treatment centers to the pipes.
Collection
[
|
...
]