Staff Reporter
The Department of Water and Sanitation (DWS) in the Free State has developed the first mobile water testing laboratory in the world in a bid to ensure water produced by different municipalities in the province meets recommended standards.
Known as the Blue Drop Trailer, the mobile lab – which remotely monitors the amount of impurities in the water produced at a water treatment plant and relays the message to a central point – remains the only one in the world with such capabilities.
Designed and developed at a cost of R3.5 million by DWS deputy director for water services regulation Gerhard Janse van Noordwyk, the trailer monitors turbidity in water, free chlorine and other aspects.
“The idea started around 2010 . . . when we realised that we don’t exactly know what’s going on at the water treatment plants in terms of operations,” said Noordwyk in an interview at Ngwathe Local Municipality Water Treatment Works in Parys where the mobile lab was recently deployed.
The DWS worked with CTE Water Tech, a private company, to produce the mobile lab.
Noordwyk said the data they often got when we they visited water treatment plants from the controllers did not always correspond with what they got when they took their own samples and analysed them in the laboratory.
“There were a couple of municipalities where we struggled with poor water quality and the communities complained,” he said.
“We didn’t have enough people to send out and monitor the situation.
“That’s why we came up with this trailer – it operates completely independently.
“I can sit in my office, log onto the trailer and I can see exactly what’s going on with the trailer parked at a water treatment plant in another municipality.”
Noordwyk said if the water quality is poor, those at the water treatment plant are immediately advised to make the necessary adjustments so that the water meets the Blue Drop status.
The Blue Drop system is a regulatory tool used by the water department to monitor the quality of drinking water.
“If free chlorine and turbidity go out of spec, it tells you there is a problem with the micro-quality of your water . . . meaning the bacteria may give you upset stomach and that is immediately addressed,” he said.
Turbidity refers to the amount of solid particles in the water which normally give it a brown colour and chlorine is basically the disinfectant that kills bacteria in the water.
The equipment can also determine if the water is too corrosive or hard. He said water that doesn’t allow soap to foam is an example of very hard water.
“We have deployed the trailer to different plants a couple of times,” Noordwyk said, adding the trailer gives essential support to municipalities when they struggle to fix their water treatment challenges.
“At the beginning of April, we deployed it to Fika-Pitso Plant in Qwaqwa where we have had serious water shortages for some time.
“We wanted to test the water quality and it worked perfectly there.”
There have been growing concerns that tap water in some municipalities is not fit for human consumption and posed a health risk to consumers and it is believed the mobile lab will help find some of the shortcomings at water treatment plants and fix them.
