Monitoring strategy for lead in drinking water at consumer's tap: field experiments in France

Abstract

Following the outcome of a European project for developing a new protocol for the monitoring of lead in drinking water, field experiments have been carried out in five supply zones in France in order to test and develop practical tools for assessing compliance/non-compliance for lead. A number of properties in each zone were randomly selected and random daytime (RDT), 30 minutes stagnation (30MS) and fully flushed (FF) samples taken. The results confirm that, at zone level, RDT or 30MS samples taken in a sufficient number of properties give almost identical results. RDT is more practical and acceptable to the consumer whereas 30MS is more reproducible and should be preferred for assessment at an individual consumer's tap. Random selection of properties appears to be a good solution for assessing the actual situation in a zone and help in the definition of priorities and type of actions to implement. Copper and nickel have also been controlled in three zones and the monitoring strategy for lead could also be used for these parameters.