Epa's water contaminant information tool expands a water security tool for all hazards

Drinking water and wastewater systems face the threat of accidental or intentional contamination from a range of hazardous substances. To help the Water Sector better prepare for and respond to serious contamination incidents, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) collaborates with partners in the sector to develop and enhance supporting tools and resources. Among the water security tools developed by EPA is the Water Contaminant Information Tool (WCIT). WCIT is a secure online database containing comprehensive data sets on regulated and non-regulated chemical, biological, and radiochemical contaminants that could cause a significant threat to public health if introduced into drinking water or wastewater systems. WCIT supports preparedness planning, incident response, response training and contaminant research. WCIT contains an analytical methods compendium, which allows users to access details on methods for both analyte screening and confirmation. Using the compendium, WCIT users can search analytical methods to compare costs, required instrumentation, relative time, and to download full analytical methods used for both regular drinking water monitoring and emergency contamination response. To increase WCIT's value as an emergency response resource, EPA has recently added an “expert system” module that guides users through all phases of response to a contamination incident. This interactive tool allows users to query for information on all aspects of responding to drinking water or wastewater contamination incidents, from initial threat evaluation and site characterization to sampling procedures and analytical method selection. WCIT has recently been expanded to contain data on 815 contaminants. As WCIT evolved from a terrorism response tool to an “All Hazards” response tool, EPA added contaminants that are found at utilities and may be accidently released from drinking water and wastewater treatment plants. WCIT provides analytical, treatment, and decontamination methods for these and other contaminants and is kept updated up-to-date with current research on infrastructure decontamination.