June 29,2018
the staff of the Ridgewood blog
Ridgewood NJ, Environmental Working Group (EWG) recently released a report raising concerns about the presence of chromium 6 – also known as hexavalent chromium – in public water supplies. Hexavalent chromium, a suspected carcinogen, is the contaminant made famous by the 2000 movie “Erin Brockovich.”
https://theridgewoodblog.net/facebook-water-filter-ads-rattle-ridgewood-residents/
https://theridgewoodblog.net/environmental-groups-report-finds-arsenic-at-ridgewood-water/
Ridgewood Water shares the EWG’s concern for water quality and public health protection. Water utilities currently monitor for “total” chromium, of which hexavalent chromium is a component. Most public water utilities, including Ridgewood Water, are in compliance with the existing standard.
The Safe Drinking Water Act, which was established to protect the quality of drinking water, requires a rigorous scientific approach for evaluating contaminants for regulation. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has been looking at health effects data on hexavalent chromium. Ridgewood Water has been testing for this substance as part of the unregulated contaminant sampling program which provides data to EPA for scientific evaluation.
It’s important to remember that detecting a substance in water does not always imply a health risk. The key question that researchers seek to answer is whether the substance presents health concerns at the level it is detected. That’s why the federal regulatory process requires EPA to examine potential health impacts of the substance, paths of exposure and occurrence data. A thorough evaluation of all this data increases the likelihood that new regulations will offer meaningful risk reduction. Ridgewood Water is committed to meeting all regulatory standards for public water supplies including any new requirements for hexavalent chromium that may be instituted.
For more information on chromium in drinking water, please refer to the following links:
https://www.epa.gov/dwstandardsregulations/chromium-drinking-water
https://www.who.int/water_sanitation_health/publications/chromium/en/
https://www.awwa.org/legislation-regulation/regulations/contaminants/hexavalent-chromium.aspx#3329298-recent-research
All I can say is I don’t know what happened to the taste of the water used to be great you couldn’t stop drinking it. Now I have to drink bottled water. If I drink Ridgewood water it’ burns the back of my throat why is that.I’m telling you something is wrong. I don’t know what it is I’m not a scientist. The Dep EPA,Must get involved. They need to do testing severely throughout the town, did any of the gas stations thanks fuel get to the system I don’t know. Just do testing.
When I fill my tea kettle it smells like a swimming pool.
The taste went to shit
I filter my water before using it in cooking. It’s changed for the worse in the 25 years I’ve been here.
Time to sell the water company to whoever wants to buy it. The mayor and council the powers that be don’t want to because that’s the cash cow. Right
If you don’t use a water softener unit, your appliances get ruined in about 6 months.
Oh please . . . I don’t have a water softener and I’ve been here 27 years without a ruined appliance. The water is fine. Give it a break.
5:51 Years ago Ridgewood water was considered so pure that pediatricians told young mothers that they could safely use it in a babies’ formula. Grocery and other stores carried limited supplies of bottled drinking water because it wasn’t needed. Ridgewood’s water now stinks and tastes terrible even when run through a water filter. Soon Ridgewood is going to be like Wayne who will not give a CO to any store that doesn’t show them their bottled water dispenser. Like almost everything in Ridgewood, water has shown a severe decline.
I also just read in the Blog that Glen Rock, and presumably the other towns who joined in the suit, is not happy about Ridgewood’s decision that the water rate is justified. They still are looking for the money they are owed for past years, much less having that still being the existing rate.