City of Laramie drinking water is in no danger of chemical contamination, city staff announced Saturday, April 12th.
Laramie citizens contacted the city with concerns about whether or not the city’s drinking water is contaminated with harmful chemicals. Some are concerned with arsenic getting into the drinking water systems, according to a “News Flash” article on the City of Laramie Website.
The concerns came after an article was published in the Laramie Boomerang about an industrial site used for 60 years for the production of aluminum, arsenic acid, strategic metals and cement. The article said arsenic levels in the ground water near the site tested 3,100 times above the Department of Environmental Quality’s (DEQ) clean up levels in 2012. There is also a 1000-ton pile of flue dust—a byproduct from processing metal—that sits under plastic tarps at the site.
This article caused Laramie citizens to be concerned with what may come into contact with the water they consume from the city. Attempting to ease citizens’ minds, the press release on the city website stated the following three points:
The Sand Creek site is located approximately 2.5 miles west of the closest municipal well.
The Sand Creek Site is located down gradient from all municipal source waters.
The natural underflow of the Casper Aquifer is from east to west (away from our wells).
Weekly, monthly, quarterly, yearly and random tests the City of Laramie conducts should help put the worries to rest, said Andy Faxon, Senior Water Plant Director.
He said all yearly reports, known as the City Consumer Confidence Report (CCR), can be found on the City of Laramie website.
Faxon said he did not find arsenic or any other seriously dangerous chemicals in water for Laramie consumption.
“[The CCR] is important so students and residents know that their water is high quality for drinking,” said Faxon.
All the testing for the CCR and other testing that keeps the water at its high quality is done by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) approved laboratories. Faxon said the water is gathered by samplers and then sent to the labs to be tested.
Faxon said there should be no concern with arsenic in water consumed by those in the city of Laramie. The high standard of testing the water treatment center has set keeps the water customers of Laramie safe, he said.
