WATER QUALITY AND HEALTH ALBANIAN CASE

1
WATER QUALITY AND HEALTHALBANIAN CASE

• Tania Floqi
• Polytechnic University of Tirana
• Vrnjacka Banja, 10.10.2007

2

• Importance of water quality
• Drinking water supply in Albania
• Water supply in Tirana
• Tiranas water quality
• - Physical characteristics
• - Chemical characteristics
• - Microbiological characteristic
• - Disinfection process
• - Health risks
• Conclusions and Recommendations

3
Importance of water quality

• Water is one of the most important chemicals
  known to men
• Rain, snow, sleet, hail, fog and dew - water
  present in the air
• Water is present on the earth surface as lakes,
  streams, wetlands, waterfalls and glaciers
• The human body is composed of 50 water
• Water is important as a solvent. Many substances
  dissolve in water sugar, salt, alcohol, etc.
• Access to safe drinking-water is important as a
  health and development issue at a national,
  regional and local level
• Water supply must be available to all

4
Drinking water supply in Albania

• Albania is a small mountainous country (28748
  km2). It has a rich hydrographic net
  (groundwater, streams, rivers, springs, lakes,
  wetlands). This net includes over 200 big natural
  resources of flowing groundwater.
• Natural water qualities of our country are
  generally good

5
Drinking water supply in Albania

• Drinking water origin
• - 80 of groundwater
• - 20 - surface waters
• Population supply
• - 85 By public system (Urban areas at
  home Rural areas public taps and
  standpipes)
• - 10 private wells
• - 4.9 treated surface water
• - 0.1 untreated surface water

6
Drinking water supply in Albania

• Quantity
• 20 50 lit/person/day at the taps
• 120 lit/person/day at the source
• 50-70 of the quantity is lost in the
  distribution system
• - Obsolete old infrastructure
• - Poor maintenance mismanagement

7
Water supply in Tirana

• Tirana region has a wide variety of natural
  geological conditions that influence water
  quality
• Tirana city takes water from
• - surface water (Bovilla dam-reservoir)
• - flowing underground sources
• - artesian pumped wells
• All the above sources are different regarding
  physical, chemical and microbiological
  characteristics

8
Tiranas water quality

• Physical characteristics
• Turbidity
• - usually in normal parameters
• - In rainy periods damaged supply network
  ranges from 8 92 ntu
• Odor Taste
• - usually in normal parameters
• - faecal odors oil odors in rainy periods and
  damaged supply network
• - odors from algae (Cyklotela diatomea) occurs
  since 2 years ago in Bovilla reservoir - from
  these period began the monitoring of human
  activites impact such as biological, physical and
  chemical indicators
• Temperature of Tiranas water sources ranges
  from 7 -17º C depending from the type of source

9
Tiranas water quality

• Chemical characteristics
• Fluoride low levels
• Arsenic, mercury and lead not present
• Nitrates varies from 3-30.4 mg/l in Bovilla
  reservoir and pumped wells in the lowlands
• Nitrates in natural groundwater in mountainous
  areas are not present
• Pesticides and herbicides not present in
  Bovilla reservoir analyzed since one year ago
• Organic Matter present in all water sources but
  not monitored because the lack of facilities

10

• Chemical characteristics
• Ammonia nitrogen - present in Bovilla reservoir,
  pumped wells and the distribution supply network
• Ammonia nitrogen is monitored as chemical
  indicator of sanitary pollution
• In pollution cases the ammonia level can reach 16
  mg/l

11

• Chemical characteristics
• Total Dissolved Solids (TDS) varies from 188.9
  mg/l to 802.2 mg/l
• - Water from pumped wells has higher TDS than
  natural surface or groundwater
• Conductivity - from 208 µmhos/cm to 944 µmhos/cm
  related with TDS concentration
• Hardness ranges
• - natural groundwater, 71 79 mg/l CaCO3
• - pumped wells, 210 275 mg/l CaCO3
• Hardness is dependent from natural geological
  conditions
• pH varies from 6.96 to 7.85, dont present
  carbonate alkalinity

12
Tiranas water quality

• Microbiological characteristics
• Tiranas water supply system is monitored by
  specialists from the Directorate of Public Health
  and from the City Water Supply and Sewerage
  Enterprise itself
• The monitored indicators are E.Coli,
  Streptococcus Faecalis and Total Coliforms

13
Tiranas water quality

• Disinfection process
• Primary disinfectant used in Bovilla treatment
  plant sodium hypochlorite (NaOCl)
• Secondary disinfectant used in distribution
  depots sodium hypochlorite (NaOCl)
• The chlorination process is made manually by
  operators often not very qualified and
  responsible, affecting the level of chlorine
  which varies from very high to very low values

14

• Health risks
• If feacal contamination is recent it is
  responsible for the presence of pathogenic agents
  including bacteria, viruses, protozoa, which may
  cause diseases from gastroenteritis to sometimes
  fatal diarrhea, dysentery, hepatitis, typhoid
  fever or cholera
• There was a cholera outbreak in 1994, in Albania,
  with 626 infected cases and 25 dead people
• Data from the Institute of Public Health indicate
  that there is a high incidence of gastroenteritis
  in Albania - the conclusions of health experts
  indicate that in most of cases the
  gastroenteritis is coming from drinking water
  pollution

15

• Health risks
• In 2006 in Tirana, there was a critic situation
  of the hepatitis B disease, because of the
  contamination of distribution supply system
• The Ministry of Health (National Sanitary
  Inspectorate) decided to increase the quantity of
  disinfectant in the distribution system so the
  residual chlorine should be from 0.3 0.5 mg/l
  (national standard) to 1 mg/l

16
Tiranas water quality

• Disinfection by-products THM
• NOM can cause various interferences in water
  treatment such as
• - React with chemical disinfectant (chlorine) to
  form disinfection by-products such as
  trihalomethanes. Trihalomethanes are suspected to
  be mutagenic, carcinogenic and/or teratogenic
• THM (18 compounds) are monitored since one year
  ago and are all in low levels

17
Conclusions

• The quality of drinking water in Tirana is
  strongly linked to the type of sources used to
  supply the population. Tirana is supplied with
  drinking water from surface, underground sources
  and artesian pumped wells. Each of these sources
  has different microbiological, physical, chemical
  and acceptability characteristics.
• Hardness can be classified as very hard (above 20
  German degrees) for the waters in lowland regions
  and as soft for the natural groundwater in
  mountainous areas
• The quality of drinking water in Tirana has been
  deteriorating in the last years. There are more
  and more cases with microbial contamination,
  mainly with feacal origin. Main reason of this is
  the continuing amortization of both drinking
  supply system and sewerage system.
• Summer months are the most common in regard to
  microbial contamination. Also, heavy rainfalls
  have shown to affect considerably the microbial
  quality of drinking water. The critical situation
  of the sewerage system creates a constant risk
  for the population health, depending mainly on
  infiltrations and out-spills in these specific
  days.
• Analyses have shown that the chemical indicator
  of water sanitary pollution (NH4) is in
  accordance with bacteriological indicators. In
  many cases the presence of NH4 is much higher
  than the allowed levels, going up to 1.4-1.6
  mg/l.
• The disinfection process is not consequent and
  analyses show that the level of chlorine is very
  variable in time and in different places of the
  supply network. Despite the bad technical
  conditions, the lack of experience and knowledge
  of the workers dealing with the chlorination
  process are main causes that affect negatively
  the distribution of chlorine in the distribution
  network.
• Analyses have shown that the chlorine
  concentration in the network is in an oblique
  correlation with the bacteriological (E. coli,
  Str. faecalis, Coliform Total) and chemical
  (NH4) indicators. Nevertheless there are cases
  when the concentration of chemical and
  bacteriological indicators is in such high levels
  that the chlorination process is not enough to
  bring them within the allowed standards

18
Recommendations

• The drinking water quality should not be
  considered as an isolated parameter of water
  supply, but as an important element that affect
  directly the health of the people.
• Because the water supply organs are responsible
  for the quality and safety of drinking water,
  there is a need to combine good operation
  techniques and preventive measures supported by
  continuous monitoring and control of the quality.
• A special attention should be made to
  microbiological characteristics of quality. The
  potential consequences linked to microbial
  contamination are so unpredictable that microbial
  control should always be of a primary importance
  and during it no changes or compromises should be
  made.
• The improvement of drinking water quality is
  closely related with its systematic monitoring.
  The establishment of a well-planned survey system
  in time and space will positively affect the
  safety of drinking water.
• Defense measures of water sources should be made
  according to their type. In the case of
  underground water sources, protection around them
  should be enforced, not allowing human activities
  within a certain radius. For surface waters, the
  selection of treatment processes should be
  oriented towards a greater water quality and
  safety.
• The sanitary inspection organs should expand and
  intensify their controls in the entire supply
  network. This will prevent future contaminations
  and diseases.
• During disinfections compromises should not be
  made in attempt to control disinfection
  by-products. Lowering the level of chlorine in
  the network is not commendable for the moment as
  the network is in a poor technical situation, but
  its level should be kept constant and within
  allowed values.
• Measures should be made to improve the
  disinfection process and in particular for the
  level of chlorine in the network. The
  fluctuations of chlorine level from very high to
  very low values can bring negative impacts on
  health. The promotion of automatic chlorinating
  systems should be promoted to replace manual
  chlorination.

19
MERCI!THANK YOU!HVALA!