The Reading Area Water Authority’s Maidencreek water treatment plant in Berks County, recently completed the third phase of the Partnership for Safe Water Program, a voluntary effort to provide safe drinking water. 

Presently, the plant provides drinking water service to approximately 87,000 people.

(Photo: Reading Area Water Authority's Dean Miller, Helen Piccone, Brian Readinger, Erin Snihur, Gene Koontz, Gary Phillips, Patrick Bauer, Jesse Goldberg, Barb Martin, Max Kurbjun, and Walter Cieplinski, and DEP's Kevin Anderson.)

The Partnership for Safe Water is made up of DEP, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, the PA Section American Water Works Association and other drinking water organizations.  Its goal is to implement preventative measures that are based on optimizing treatment plant performance.

Phase III entails a detailed, peer-reviewed report that summarizes the rigorous self-assessment portion of the program. 

This phase is specifically geared toward identifying weaknesses in plant operation, design and administration that could lead to a breakthrough of waterborne disease-causing organisms into the finished water that is distributed to consumers.  Correcting these weaknesses helps prevent waterborne disease outbreaks from pathogenic organisms like Cryptosporidium and Giardia. 

By completing this phase of the program, the Maidencreek plant provides an additional measure of protection to drinking water consumers.

The Maidencreek water treatment plant is now one of 60 plants to complete this phase of the partnership in Pennsylvania.

For more information, visit DEP’s Partnership for Safe Water Program webpage.

(Reprinted from the Feb. 4 DEP News.  Click Here to sign up for your own copy.)

2/8/2016