SECTION NEWS
CA-NV AWWA Volunteers
Make a Difference in the Salinas Valley
Volunteer from CA-NV AWWA recently fielded a team to address nitrates in the Salinas Valley. Here’s what happened.
By Tarrah Henrie
The CEC volunteer team: Tarrah Henrie, Sarah Plummer, Erin McCauley, and Craig Thompson, independent review panel who served on the project.
IN 2013, THE AMERICAN WATER WORKS ASSOCIATION
(AWWA) engaged in a partnership with the American Soci-ety
of Civil Engineers (ASCE) and Engineers Without Borders
USA (EWB) to provide underserved communities with technical
experts to solve water and wastewater challenges. The Com-munity
Engineering Corps (CEC) relies on volunteers to help
communities overcome the technical hurdles they face in provid-ing
safe and reliable water. At the time of the launch, the program
had five “proof of concept” projects. Since its inception, over
60 communities have been paired with project teams that have
engineered solutions impacting more than 100,000 people.
I became aware of the CEC at the CA-NV AWWA Annual
Spring Conference in 2015. Alan Roberson, then with AWWA,
introduced the program at the Monday morning leadership
breakfast. I was eager to volunteer, but there were no projects
in California. By Spring 2016, there were projects in California
and Phil Holderness had a new position as CA-NV AWWA CEC
Committee Chair. At the 2016 Annual Spring Conference, Phil
made a presentation about the need for volunteers to take on
projects in the Salinas Valley for small nitrate contaminated sys-tems.
I thought to myself: nitrate contaminated systems….the
Salinas Valley…This is the perfect volunteer opportunity for me!
Prior to joining Corona Environmental Consulting, I was the
manager of water quality for California Water Service (Cal Wa-ter).
In that position, I learned more than I ever wanted to know
10 SOURCE fall 2017
about nitrate contamination in the Salinas Valley. Back in 2001, I
had recommended strong base anion exchange treatment as an
interim solution while replacement wells were drilled into the
deeper aquifer, which in the Salinas Valley is free from nitrate
contamination. In other locations, I recommended blending when
there was a low nitrate source that could be used for compliance.
These solutions were successfully implemented. Cal Water also
assisted the state by connecting two small nitrate contaminated
groundwater systems to the King City system via a Proposition
84 grant-funded pipeline. Well modification was tried in two
locations with mixed results. When it comes to solving nitrate
problems I have experience with all of the most common solu-tions.
Yes. This was the perfect volunteer opportunity for me.
The agricultural economy in Salinas relies on two things: fer-tilizer
to increase crop production and migrant labor to pick those
strawberries and leafy green vegetables. Nitrate in the drinking
water arises largely from excess use of fertilizer on the valley’s
crops. It has been linked to blue baby syndrome, a potentially
fatal illness that decreases the oxygen-carrying capacity of hemo-globin
in infants. The migrant workers often live in work camps
and drink water from wells with nitrate over the regulatory limit,
contaminated by excess fertilizer on the same fields they harvest.
You don’t have to leave the U.S. to see the level of poverty that
you may associate with other countries. Go to Salinas.
In 2016, the CEC accepted the invitation of the Sacramento-