Wei Shubing (left) and his wife must use bottled water for cooking after Longjiang River was cotaminated by cadmium in January, affecting residents of Liuzhou city in the Guangxi Zhuang antonomous region. [Photo/provided to China Daily]
New standards for drinking water will come into force in China on July 1, with the number of quality indicators rising to 106 from 35. While that's almost on a par with the standards used in the European Union, some experts have raised concerns about the feasibility of the new system.
"There are about 3,000 water companies in China. Judging by their
production technologies and their quality-testing facilities, most still
have a long way to go before they can meet the new standards," said Li
Fuxing, director of the Beijing Institute of Public Health and Drinking
Water.
Meanwhile, Fu Tao, director of Tsinghua University's Water Policy
Research Center, said that the number of cities with the facilities to
test all 106 indicators covers a very small portion of the area served
by the industry.
Traditionally, the treatment process consists of four steps:
flocculation, precipitation, filtration and chlorination. The first
three remove particle pollutants and reduce the water’s turbidity,
making it clearer to the eye, while the addition of chlorine kills
micro-organisms.
Chlorination is seen as one of the major innovations of the 20th
century, but in 1977 scientists in the United States discovered that
organic compounds left in the water after the first three steps in the
treatment process may react with chlorine to generate potentially
carcinogenic byproducts.
Under the regulations, first released in 2006, all treatment plants
are obliged to meet the new criteria by July 1 this year. Some cities,
such as Beijing, quickly achieved that goal, but despite the five-year
hiatus, many companies have yet to upgrade their equipment or production
techniques. "By the end of 2009, 98 percent of China’s water plants
were still employing production processes that have been in use for
decades," Lan Weiguang, adjunct associate professor from the chemistry
department of the National University of Singapore, wrote in his micro
blog.
Meanwhile, the number of indicators to test for organic compounds in
drinking water will rise to 53 from just five. "That means the
government has realized the importance of controlling organic
pollutants," said Lan. "But most water plants fail to meet the target
because of outdated production processes."
Some experts have asked why it's taken so long for the new
regulations to come into force.
"Other countries may use fewer
indicators than us, but they are strictly implemented as soon they’re
released. We have waited five years for these standards to be enforced,"
said Li. "Also, in many countries, the standards are revised annually,
based on various data," he added, noting that, before 2006, the last
revision in China was back in 1985.
The 2006 standard unified the water quality standards in the
country’s rural and urban areas for the first time. But even as plants
in the city struggle to meet the new criteria, those in rural areas face
an even tougher challenge because their quality standards have always
lagged behind.
Take quality monitoring in the rural areas of the southwestern
province of Sichuan as an example. Work didn’t begin until 2004 and
official statistics show that only 20 indicators were being measured by
2011, nowhere near the 1985 standard of 35, to say nothing of the 106
stipulated by the 2006 reforms.
Despite this, Sichuan is seen as something of a role model in the
improvement of water quality, having undertaken a large number of
projects to provide safe drinking water to its rural population, which
is geographically dispersed over vast distances with many people living
in inaccessible mountainous regions. Meanwhile, the situation in
provinces such as Yunnan and Guizhou is much worse.
Body blows
The issue of water safety has been in the spotlight recently after a
report in the Century Weekly magazine earlier this month quoted unnamed
industry insiders who said only about 50 percent of the water in urban
areas actually meets the required standards.
A second body blow was delivered by Dong Liangjie, an expert in heavy
metal pollution in water and a former researcher at the University of
Hawaii. Quoting a paper recently published in a scientific journal, Dong
claimed that researchers have found contaminants in all 23
water-testing areas that, under certain conditions, can produce effects
similar to contraceptives.
Meanwhile, other experts said that, given the severely polluted state
of the source water and the ineffectual treatment processes, less than
50 percent of the nation’s tap water reaches the required standards.
In response, officials from several areas went on the record to say
that tap water is safe to drink, in their provinces at least. The
figures they released were all higher than 95 percent, a huge increase
on those quoted by most media.
Four days after the Century Weekly magazine report was published,
Shao Yisheng, director of the monitoring center of the Ministry of
Housing and Urban-Rural Development, released the latest official safety
figures: 83 percent. Shao cited a survey conducted by the ministry in
2011, but didn’t reveal the locations of the 17 percent that failed to
meet national standards.
"The water quality in cities such as Beijing and Shanghai is
relatively stable, but for residents of small cities, 50 percent or 83
percent doesn’t really mean anything."
Netizens were dissatisfied with Shao’s figures and asked for more
information, including the locations where the water quality failed to
meet the standards. They also wanted to know what measures have been
taken to rectify the situation, but the ministry has turned down
requests for interviews on the topic.
Source-water quality
The safety of tap water is dependent on many factors, the most
important being the quality of source water, according to experts. The
latest figure, released by the Ministry of Water Resources, is 80
percent nationally. But Century Weekly quoted Song Lanhe, another
official from the ministry’s monitoring center, as saying that the rate
is actually closer to 50 percent.
"Much of China’s source water is now surrounded by residential
buildings, especially farms," said Tsinghua University’s Fu. "The
increase in annual agricultural output is supported by the use of huge
amounts of chemicals and fertilizers, which will definitely enter the
water table and contaminate our source water."
Meanwhile, sewage dumped into rivers by chemical plants has also
played a major role in changing the main pollutants from micro-organisms
to organic compounds and heavy metals, many of which are toxic. "The
facilities and equipment currently used in water plants were able to
remove source-water pollutants efficiently before the 1980s, but they
can’t deal with those we face now," said Li.
The nation’s antiquated pipeline network is another thorn in the side
of those seeking to improve the quality of the water supply. Statistics
released by the China Institute of Water Resources and Hydropower
Research suggest that approximately 6 percent of the pipes have been in
use for more than 50 years. "The water quality decreases by about 10
percent during this (delivery) process," said Wang Hao, head of the
water resources department at the institute, according to a recent
report from the Xinhua News Agency.
"The levels of bacteria in the pipes increase tenfold every decade.
Some corrosive substances in the pipes may also be absorbed by the
water," said Zhao Feihong, a researcher at the Beijing Institute of
Public Health and Drinking Water. Projects to replace the older pipes
are currently ongoing nationwide, but China’s vast landmass means the
situation will take a long time to rectify.
Other dangers lurk unseen too: To guarantee adequate water pressure,
buildings higher than six stories usually utilize a holding tank on the
top floor. The system, known as 'gravity feeding" works well, but can
become a health hazard if not carefully maintained. "These water tanks
usually lack a regular sanitation management regime and are often
loosely sealed," commented Lan Weiguang. "Green moss, bacteria and even
the bodies of small animals are often found in them."
Low levels of funding
According to insiders from the Ministry of Housing and Urban-Rural
Development, the fundamental problem in maintaining water quality is the
low level of low level of funding. "Investment is far from sufficient
in this sector," they said.
Those insiders received support from a number of experts. The
problems inherent in the treatment process, the pipes and water tanks
can be solved with the existing technology, they said, but there simply
isn’t enough money invested in the system to provide that technology.
That problem is compounded by the fact that even raising the water
quality indicator by one degree results in spiraling treatment costs.
Industry insiders told Xinhua that testing all 106 indicators in one
sample costs 15,000 to 20,000 yuan ($2,370 to $3,160). And as all of the
indicators must be tested at least once a year, and others on a monthly
or weekly basis, that sort of money is beyond most cities at present.
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