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May 27, 2022
from the
Board and Staff of FRWA
HURRICANE SEASON BEGINS JUNE 1!!!
We are all looking forward to the Memorial Weekend, but with each Memorial Day, along with the cookouts and road trips comes June first, the start of Hurricane Season. This date has struck dread in the hearts of many Floridians as we ready for another season of weather watching, preparing, and if we are lucky breathing a sigh of relief that we were spared. If we are not so lucky, there are days of picking up the pieces, making repairs, and living without electricity and clean water.

All predictions point to a year of above average activity. As you can see by the graphic above, we can anticipate 3-6 major hurricanes. However, sometimes the lesser hurricanes do more damage with rainfall and residual winds. This year could be particularly trying with the supply change issue delaying new and needed parts/materials for recovery. The "bailing wire/duct tape" phase may need to last longer.

We at Florida Rural Water are preparing for the worse and hoping for the best. Our warehouse is stocked with different sizes of generators and many other types of emergency equipment so that we can be ready for any type of emergency. We have developed Standard Operating Procedures in case of an emergency, that can be deployed on a moments notice. The office in Tallahassee is set with emergency generators so that we are able to monitor our members needs at all times.

Is your system ready for what may befall them this hurricane season? Have you updated your information on WATER Tracker at https://flwatertracker.com/? Is your Emergency Response Plan up to date? With the start of hurricane season, here are some more suggestions that you may want to consider to be sure that your system is ready for "the storm":
  • Contact Electrician to Check Emergency Generator & Run on Load Bank 
  • Contact Electrician to Check Running Amps on Pumps
  • Make Sure Unnecessary Equipment is Properly Decommissioned
  • Clean, Inspect & Disinfect Aerator/Degassifier Screens, Sprayheads & Gaskets

For more information on the upcoming hurricane season, please refer to the articles below.
Articles of Interest
NATIONAL NEWS
Cybersecurity for Water/Wastewater & Operational Technology The protection of critical assets has never been more top of mind as industrial attacks on water/wastewater facilities and other critical infrastructure providers are on the rise. more

Wastewater SARS-CoV-2/COVID-19 Testing with ddPCR Technology Infected individuals shed the SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus in their feces even if they are asymptomatic, and the shed viruses are detectable in wastewater samples days before symptoms appear. more

Unifying Your Water and Wastewater Operations From everyday living to industrial operations and production, water is vital to life. With 71% of the earth’s surface covered in water, its essential nature remains undisputed. Water and water assets are vital components of productivity in industries across different sectors. more

New PFAS Data Fills Research Gap This article highlights several nationwide sampling efforts performed by CDM Smith and the Water Research Foundation to better understand PFAS. more

Companies Face Billions in Damages as PFAS Lawsuits Flood Courts (Bloomberg) For years, plaintiffs’ lawyers suing over health and environmental damage from so called forever chemicals, known collectively as PFAS, focused on one set of deep pockets—E. I. du Pont de Nemours and Co. more

EPA Adds Five PFAS Chemicals to List of Risk-Based Values Agency updates Regional Screening and Removal Management Levels to protect human health and the environment. more

PFAS cost recovery lawsuit: Time is of the essence! Napoli Shkolnik has partnered with The National Rural Water Association (NRWA) to bring together utility systems from across the country that have concerns or have been affected by PFAS contamination. This potential landmark contamination case could help water and wastewater systems recoup money spent on treatment and remediation. more

Custom Water Panel Answers Multiple Water Questions From intake through flocculation, sedimentation, filtration, and disinfection, water plants monitor and control a number of water quality parameters before going to distribution. Increasingly plant managers are recognizing the value of a final check on those parameters. more

White House: $110B in infrastructure funding delivered The White House on Monday said it has released $110 billion in funding from the $1 trillion infrastructure package that seeks to fix crumbling roads, expand broadband internet and improve the electrical grid. more

ASDWA Provides Support for EPA’s Build America, Buy America Waiver for WIFIA Projects with Design Already Underway ASDWA submitted comments to EPA on a waiver for the requirements under Build America, Buy America (BABA). The Agency proposed to waive BABA requirements for Water Infrastructure Finance and Innovation Act (WIFIA) borrowers that initiated project design plans prior to May 14, 2022 – the day that BABA went into effect. more

EPA Announces $1.9 billion in State Revolving Loan Funds to Upgrade Water Infrastructure Nationwide Late last Friday (May 13), EPA announced $1.9 billion in new base federal grant funding to the State Revolving Funds (SRF). These funds are split between the Clean Water SRF (CWSRF) and the Drinking Water SRF (DWSRF), with the two programs receiving $1.2 billion and $728 million, respectively. more

STATE NEWS
Florida special tax districts like Disney’s Reedy Creek, explained The standoff between Gov. Ron DeSantis and the Walt Disney Co. could have consequences reaching far beyond a battle between two political titans. more

Test Results Show 18 Water Samples Exceed PFAS Limits Near NAS Whiting Field and its OLFs  The U.S. Navy on November 9 issued a press release, confirming a PFAS release area at OLF Santa Rosa, which is located inside Santa Rosa County’s Well Field Protection Area in East Milton. more

Help springs by transforming North Florida from an extractive to a creative economy - Gainesville Sun Turpentine, phosphate, fish, timber, water: These are natural resources of North Florida, and they have all either been decimated or are declining in quality and abundance. more

Palm Beach approves additional $100K for water feasibility analysis | Palm Beach Daily News Though a final decision could be years away, the town of Palm Beach is moving forward with plans to study a range of alternatives that would extend or replace its retail water agreement with West Palm Beach. more

Developer says he still can finance Rickenbacker Causeway upgrade | Miami Today Improve safety for cyclists, replace and enhance Bear Cut Bridge, deal with resiliency and sea level rise, and create a 20-acre park and beach on Virginia Key were improvements the Plan Z Consortium intended to develop as part of an unsolicited proposal for the Venetian and Rickenbacker causeways. more

Cocoa City Council mulls options to remove septic tanks along Indian River Drive | Florida Today Older homes in Cocoa using septic tanks are being eyed for a potentially major change to prevent nutrients from seeping into the Indian River Lagoon, adding to its woes. more

Water is critical for Florida’s economy | Villages News Last week, the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee held a nearly all-day meeting on one of our top priority bills – the Water Resources and Development Act, also called WRDA. more

Fecal matter discovered in Immokalee water wells | NBC-2 Multiple wells in Immokalee have tested positive for E. coli contamination, according to the Immokalee Water & Sewer District. more

Small Community Leads Central Florida In Potable Water Reuse Implementation The city of Altamonte Springs, located in Seminole County, Florida, was one of the first in the area to attack its water challenges by investigating drinking 
water reuse. more

Boil water notice issued in Bunnell after storms - Click Orlando A boil water notice issued by the city of Bunnell after severe storms on Saturday was lifted on Wednesday, according to a news release. more
This Week in Water History
May 27, 1755: Hans Christopher Christiansen installed the first municipal water pumping plant in America at Bethlehem, PA; city supplied from a 70 foot high tank that was filled with water pumped from a spring through wooden pipes.

“Begun in 1754 and enlarged in 1762, the Bethlehem Waterworks is thought to be the first municipal pumping system to provide drinking and washing water in the United States. Johann Christopher Christensen devised the system in 1754 to transfer spring water from the Monocray Creek flood plain to the Moravian settlement on the bluff above it. Six years later, Christensen enlarged the waterworks and installed it in a 24-foot-square limestone rubble structure with a red-tile covered hipped-bellcast-gable roof. The system’s 18-foot undershot waterwheel powered three single acting cast-iron pumps which forced spring water through wood (later lead) pipes 320 feet (94 vertical feet) by a collecting tower, and from there water flowed by gravity to strategically placed cisterns throughout the community. Machines to raise water had been in use in Europe for centuries, but until the construction of the Bethlehem Waterworks, none had been erected in the American Colonies.

In 1652 the Water-Works Company of Boston had constructed a gravity conduit system that used bored logs to convey water from wells and springs to a 12-foot-square reservoir, but the system had not fulfilled the expectations of its promoters and had fallen into disuse. Christensen, born in Schleswig-Holstein in 1716 and trained during his youth in a royal mill in Hadersleben, probably took his ideas for the Bethlehem system from his knowledge of the forcing pumps that had been in use in many German cities since the end of the 15th century. The system served the city until 1832.

By the 1960s the area had become an automobile junkyard. The stone pumphouse was restored in the 1970s, and the waterwheel and pumps were subsequently reconstructed based on the original plans that had been preserved in the Moravian Archives in Germany. The Old Waterworks is a National Historic Landmark.”

To enjoy more opportunities to take a look at the past in water history, go to this link.