This week saw the whole of the whole of the Carolina’s Water and Environment industry descend on Myrtle Beach for the South Carolina Environment Conference. This annual joint event with the WEF and AWWA chapters has become a gathering point for the South East Industry and AMS were there in force.
On the back of two large coal ash spills in the region the SCDHEC was understandable focused on the damage that did to the regions water sources and what emerging contaminants future regulations may effect the region. Without a current regulation to deal with bromides a number of utilities have been caught out with the increases in brominated Disinfection by-products which have been picked up with the Stage 2 DBP rule taking effect in the last year.
This theme was continued as Frank Rombardo of Jacobs Engineering presented on designing for bromide issues with Stage 2 and David Ladner of Clemson University looked at new type of carbon for removing emerging contaminents.
Day two kicked off with Paul Hargette of Black and Veatch and Jane Byrne of Charleston Water telling us about the long term strategy for the Charleston system which included how to address the increasing organics, bromide and DBP level issues in the region
Aeration was the solution offered by Solarbee, Pax and Hazen and Sawyer presenting on examples from Pittsburgh where there are similar issues. All agreed that extensive online monitoring was the first and best way to assess the issue before finding a solution. A great few days finished with lunch at the beach to enjoy the last of the sunshine before people headed back north into the snow. See you next year!