Since 2005, Tony Hernandez has been hard at work on the Cortez backflow prevention program.
By the end of this year, Hernandez, cross-connection administrator for the Cortez Public Works Department, said he plans to have 100 percent of residential water connections in the city evaluated for cross-connections and if needed, controlled for backflow prevention.
That’s one year ahead of the schedule stipulated by the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment.
The city has addressed mobile home parks, RV parks and large apartment complexes, he said, adding that about 30 apartment units still need to be evaluated. And in 2015, the city replaced more than 3,000 manual water meters with automatic meters with built-in backflow prevention assemblies.
Hernandez said single-family homes don’t have to worry about backflow prevention unless they have a buried irrigation system. Apartment complexes and multifamily units with a single meter are required to have a backflow assembly. He said the city will give residents time to come into compliance.
“Now we’re just looking at smaller duplexes, triplexes that are in residential areas,” Hernandez said.
It’s an task that could save lives and prevent outbreaks of waterborne disease. A cross-connection occurs whenever the public water system connects to a residential or commercial building. A backflow prevention assembly protects the public water supply from contamination in the case of a backflow event.
“When a cross-connection is discovered, it needs to be controlled, and so it’s controlled with backflow prevention assemblies or backflow prevention methods,” Jorge Delgado, senior field engineer and backflow prevention and cross-connection control specialist for CDPHE, said.
New state regulationsDelgado said Colorado has regulated cross-connections since the 1960s. In 2015, the Colorado General Assembly updated those rules and added a cross-connection and backflow prevention control rule.
Before the changes went into effect on Jan. 1, 2016, Delgado said CDPHE engaged stakeholders and found that most water system managers in Colorado were checking about half their systems for cross-connections.
Now, water systems are required to evaluate a progressively higher percentage of nonsingle-family residences for cross-connections annually, up to 100 percent by Dec. 31, 2020.
“It’s been three years since it’s been in effect, and we’re moving forward,” he said.
Delgado said Colorado is “definitely” on track to meet that 2020 goal. He said CDPHE performs sanitary surveys and issues violations for water systems that don’t meet the department’s compliance ratios, which hasn’t been a problem in Cortez.
He said CDPHE performed a sanitary survey in Cortez in Feb. 2018 and found nothing wrong.
“Cortez – the last time our inspector went out there – there was no compliance issues and that is the current status,” Delgado said.
Hernandez said Cortez is at more than 90 percent compliance on evaluating connections. The state required 80 percent compliance by Dec. 31, 2018.
“We’re ahead of the curve as far as that, and we’ve got a full year to get the rest of them done and we’ll be 100 percent compliant as far as the state is concerned,” Hernandez said.
Who cares?In simple terms, Hernandez explained the importance of backflow prevention.
If, for example, someone wants to spray weed killer, they might dilute the chemicals by placing a hose in a bucket. During a backflow event, instead of spraying water into the bucket, negative pressure would suck those chemicals back into the public water supply.
A backflow valve prevents that from happening. Hardware stores sell ¾-inch assemblies starting at $100.
“It’s a fail-safe system,” Hernandez said.
He said a backflow event might occur if there’s a water main break downhill from a home. The backflow preventer has two check valves and one discharge valve, he said. The preventer would close the check valve in a backflow event and discharge the polluted water to prevent contamination to the building or the public water system.
There are plenty of situations that call for a backflow preventer.
Greg Naugle, fuel services manager for CDPHE, said fire suppression systems often mix a type of antifreeze called ethylene glycol while connected to a potable waterline.
“That backflow prevention assembly on that fire suppression keeps in the ethylene glycol from bleeding back into the drinking waterline,” Naugle said.
The number of possible backflow contamination issues varies from year to year. In 2018, Delgado said CDPHE became aware of three potential contamination events. Two were isolated to buildings with backflow prevention. In a third instance, in Sterling, Colorado, Delgado said CDPHE wasn’t sure if contamination occurred, so they issued a local water bottle advisory.
“The Health Department, we don’t play the guessing game of, ‘Hey, did it happen or not?’” Delgado said. “If you can’t prove that it didn’t happen, we’re going to take action to protect the public.”
Delgado said CDPHE isn’t trying to scare people, but if there is a severe chemical contamination event, someone could die.
sdolan@the-journal.com