Information Letter
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Drinking Water Inspectorate |
18 February 2008
DWI Information Letter 03/2008
To: Board Level and
Day to Day Contacts of Water and Sewerage Companies and Water Companies in England and
Wales
Dear Sir/Madam
GUIDANCE ON THE NOTIFICATION OF EVENTS
Background
The Inspectorate recently advised the industry via Information Letter 10/2007 of an update to its guidance on the notification of events which takes the form of a stand alone document, and is available on the DWI website in the section ‘Guidance notes and codes of practice’. The guidance will be reviewed and revised at regular intervals and in the light of experience. The Inspectorate expects companies to take account of the guidance in deciding on whether or not to notify, and in training of staff who have responsibility for the operational management and reporting of events and incidents.
Following the removal of the 1 oocyst/10 litres treatment standard in the Water Supply (Water quality) 2000/2001 (Amendment) Regulations 2007, the most recent update incorporates a requirement to notify all positive Cryptosporidium results in treated water samples; this requirement stands. The purpose of this Information Letter is to advise companies that further clarification has been added to this guidance to inform how this notification should be undertaken (www.dwi.gov.uk/guidance) .
A proforma has been developed in consultation with WaterUK, which is contained in Annex 3 (MS Word format) of the guidance. Companies are requested to use this for all positive Cryptosporidium results in treated water samples in order to confirm specific information about the result and its implications. For all results for which the answer to any of the questions in Section 1 is ‘Yes’, Section 2 should be completed and used as the basis for an event notification, in accordance with the updated guidance. A duplicate copy of the proforma will not be required to accompany the result in subsequent compliance returns.
For results to which the Company deem the answer to all the questions in Section 1 is ‘No’ the form should be retained and submitted along with monthly data returns.
Monthly Compliance Data Returns
To ensure that all positive results for Cryptosporidium are identifiable in compliance
data returns the Inspectorate have updated Information Letter 9/2007 to clarify that
companies should submit sample results for C111 reported to 3 decimal places and the
'‹' limit of detection qualifier must only be added for tests whose sample
value is less than 0.001 oocyst per 10l (the equivalent of 1 oocyst in 10,000 litres
sample volume) before rounding.
Any tests with sample results of 0.001 or greater (i.e not including the '‹' symbol) should be accompanied by a completed proforma, and the full filename of this should be referenced in square brackets in the ‘Comments’ field of that data record [XXX-C111-dd-mm-yy.xls].
Copies of this letter are being sent to Pamela Taylor, Chief Executive, Water UK; Richard Wood, Water Supply and Regulation Division, Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs; Natalie Howes, Climate Change and Water Division, Welsh Assembly Government; Colin McLaren, Drinking Water Quality Regulator for Scotland; Randal Scott, Drinking Water Inspectorate for Northern Ireland; Tony Smith and Chairs of the Regional Consumer Council for Water; Rowena Tye for Office of Water Services; Tony Warn, Environment Agency; Nigel Harrison, Food Standards Agency; and Gary Coleman at the Health Protection Agency.
This letter is being sent electronically to Board Level and day to day contacts. Please acknowledge receipt by email to dwi.informationletters@defra.gsi.gov.uk. Hard copies are not being sent but the letter may be freely copied. Any enquiries about the letter should be addressed directly to laura.moss@defra.gsi.gov.uk
Yours faithfully
Sharon A Evans
Deputy Chief Inspector (Operations)