Drinking Water Watch
Drinking Water Watch is a virtual tool provided by the NC Department of Environmental Quality’s Public Water Supply Section. The search engine allows customers of public community water systems to generate reports and access information on their water utility.
The reports provided summarize current information in the PWSS database. Water system components--such as each well, intake, treatment plant, storage tank and the distribution system--are referred to as facilities.
Each water system has at least one facility. Water system facilities may have one or more sampling points associated to them. As an example, a plant facility might be labeled as P01 with the entry point (sampling point) known as E01. A water system's monitoring requirements are determined from facility information and the number of customers served by the system.
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Water Quality My Water Smells - What Does it Mean?
Have you noticed a sulfur smell when you turn on the water at the sink, in the bath, and hot water? Do you sometimes see a pink residual in the bathtub or sink?
The water that comes to your tap actually contains small quantities of many substances. Most are beneficial, such as the appropriate amount of a disinfectant, like chlorine, that helps keep your water safe from germs and fluoride, which helps prevent tooth decay.
Carolina Water Service is required to follow all the state and federal water quality standards to provide our customers reliable water. This means we must treat the water before it gets to your home to remove potentially harmful bacteria.
What is the primary reason the smell or the pink residue (which is bacteria) may happen? Your water filtration system may be removing the chlorine or chloramines Carolina Water Service uses to treat your water. This may explain why your neighbor beside you or down the street, who is not using a water filtration system water has no smell or residue.
How can you prevent the smell and other issues from happening? If you must have a water filtration system in your home, it is strongly suggested that you monitor the filters, change them frequently.
Filters are recommended to be checked and replaced every six to eight months by most manufacturers. If you have not checked your system or the filters, it is recommended to do so as soon as possible. It is a good practice to keep a replacement filter(s) on hand to make the switch helpful and easy.
Another common occurrence is a “rotten egg” odor. Many times, this is caused by a reaction between naturally occurring sulfates in the water and a corroded magnesium or aluminum anode rod in water heaters. To get rid of the odor, you’ll need to flush and disinfect your water heater tank and consider replacing the anode rod with a zinc or aluminum-zinc alloy rod, as they do not react negatively to sulfates.
Carolina Water Service receives calls to test customer’s water that smells or is cloudy. When the company sends an operator to your home to conduct the water quality test, the water is always taken from an outside spigot to obtain water before it reaches the in-home water filtration system. Over 95% of the test reveal no signs of smell or cloudy appearance.
To seek more information about water and filtration system, check out the Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) website at https://www.epa.gov/ground-water-and-drinking-water