Do Current Practices for Monitoring Reclaimed Water Provide Adequate Tools for Assessment of Waterborne Pathogens?

Following both the Environmental Protection Agency's Guidelines for Reclaimed Water and their own regulations, many states monitor their effluents for pathogens and bacteria, using a bacterial indicator such as total coliforms or fecal conforms to answer a slew of questions pertaining to the treatment, the presence/absence of organisms, and the microbiological safety of the water. But is our data able to accurately answer all those questions? This research was developed to determine if routine monitoring approaches can be adapted to provide more information on the microbial water quality of the reclaimed water. To that purpose, federal regulations, California and Florida's state regulations and utilities sampling practices, and a literature review were developed in order to develop decision trees that could answer each individual stakeholder's concerns. Three decision trees were designed, the first being for regulatory compliance, the second for disinfection effectiveness, and the last for pathogen monitoring.