Residents notified of radioactive water tests

'I'll drink it,' state official says

By Andrea J. Cook, Journal staff | Monday, January 12, 2009

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Box Elder residents should receive notices within the next week alerting them to the presence of radium, a naturally occurring type of radioactive metal, in one of the city's two water wells, Mayor Al Dial said.

Box Elder's notice stems from a violation that occurred this summer, when high levels of radium 226 and radium 228 were detected during a routine test of a new well. The well has since passed another quarterly test, Dial said.

After a water system fails a water test, the system is considered in violation of the standards. To bring a water system into compliance takes four quarterly tests with an annual average that is below the standard. 

Meanwhile, the city must send water customers quarterly notices until that annual goal is met, a practice that causes "undue panic," Dial said.

Notifying customers that their water wells have radioactive contaminants has become a quarterly ritual for area water systems dealing with violations of state and federal drinking water standards because of the presence of radium 226/228.

The Colonial Pines Sanitary District, southwest of Rapid City; Ponderosa Park, also in the southwest Rapid City area; Shirttail Gulch, near Deadwood; and Rainbow Water Company, south of Box Elder, have water sources with higher than accepted radioactivity.

Only one of Colonial Pines' seven wells has a radioactive content that exceeds state standards, according to Jim Martin, the sanitary district's manager.

Use of the Whispering Pines Well is restricted to the summer and accounts for only 8 percent to 9 percent of the district's total water production, Martin said. When it is used, the well's water is blended with water from other wells to reduce the radioactive content. 

Mark Mayer, administrator of the state Department of Environment and Natural Resources drinking water program, says area water systems with radioactive contamination are working on solutions to their water quality issues.

"I'll drink it," he said.

Mayer characterizes the presence of radioactive contaminants as a chronic problem that a handful of water systems must deal with.

The health risk is not acute for people whose water comes from one of these systems, he said. Any potential harm from drinking the water is said to be cumulative over a lifetime.

New Underwood City Finance Officer Meri Jo Anderson is familiar with the concern that the water quality notices provoke.

Although the city's water is currently not in violation of state standards, the city is actively pursuing treatment options to remove radioactive contaminants from one city well. That well has the city's better-tasting water, Anderson said. The city currently blends water from both wells to control radioactivity.

Contact Andrea Cook at 394-8423 or andrea.cook@rapidcityjournal.com.