JOSEPH COTRUVO
President of Joseph Cotruvo and Associates
Water, Environment, and Public Health Consultants in Washington, DC
Keynote Speaker, Water Track
Water: Environment and Health (Science and Regulations)
The Clean Water Act (CWA) amendments of 1972 and the Safe Drinking Water Act (SDWA) of 1974 et seq have resulted in major improvements in ambient and drinking water quality. The CWA imposed mandates for at least secondary treatment on municipal wastewater treatment plants, plus Pretreatment requirements, Effluent Guidelines on industrial categories, and National Pollution Discharge Elimination System (NPDES) permits to protect ambient waters.
The SDWA covers about 50,000 Community Water Supplies and 150,000 Public Water Supplies, with more than 300,000,000 regular users. Systems with 15 connections or 25 persons are included in the federal law, not private wells. It contains Maximum Contaminant Levels, treatment requirements, and monitoring and reporting requirements.
The SDWA regulations cover virtually all microbial contaminants via E.coli surrogate MCLs filtration and disinfection requirements, all radionuclides, about 90 organic and inorganic chemicals, and disinfection byproducts via THM and HAA surrogates. Waterborne disease outbreaks from sanitary source contamination are consistently being reduced, but legionellosis and outbreaks due to distribution system failures are now the primary waterborne diseases.
The presentation will discuss several current issues including: Legionella and other regrowth microbial issues, Chromium VI, THMs and Bladder Cancer, Lead in Flint and Newark, Plastic microparticles in water, Perfluorocompounds, Algal toxins, Infrastructure, and Chemicals of Emerging Concern. It will suggest what EPA’s priorities should be to assure public health protection from drinking water problems.
Biography
Joseph Cotruvo is president of Joseph Cotruvo and Associates, Water, Environment and Public Health Consultants in Washington, DC. His PhD is in Physical Organic Chemistry from the Ohio State University. He is Board Certified in Environmental Sciences, and a Research Professor in Chemistry and Environmental Sciences at the University of Toledo. At USEPA he was the first Director of the Drinking Water Standards Division, and Director of the Risk Assessment Division in the Toxic Chemicals program. His Division developed comprehensive national drinking water risk assessments and regulations for microbial contaminants, organic and inorganic chemicals, radionuclides, the original regulations for THM disinfection by-products, surface water filtration, and Lead and Copper corrosion control rules, and initiated EPA’s Drinking Water Health Advisory Program for unregulated contaminants and emergencies. His current advisory work includes the committee producing World Health Organization Guidelines for Drinking Water Quality, and numerous oversight panels on drinking water quality, desalination, and potable water reuse. He served 8 years on the Washington DCWater Board of Directors mostly as Chairman of the Water Quality Committee. His current work includes lead exposure, legionella assessment and management, bromate water treatment and toxicology, algal toxins, disinfection byproducts and bladder cancer, comprehensive microbial analyses by Next Generation Sequencing, He has over 300 publications, books, presentations and articles on health risk, water quality, policy and safety. He recently received the 2019 Science Award from the American Academy of Environmental Engineers and Scientists.