Drinking water test results
Requested By: Dave Carter
Tagged:
water,
drink,
drinking water,
ecoli,
bacteria,
protozoa,
health
I believe the city tests drinking water regularly at its water treatment plants (and perhaps elsewhere in the water system). I would like to see the results of these tests: turbidity, flow, etc., and any bacteria or protozoa tests in the treated water. Ideally, it would be great to see this data going back 10+ years.
Some local results results are occasionally (approx one set of tests per quarter) made available via the province's drinking water surveillance program (http://www.ene.gov.on.ca/environment/en/resources/collection/data_downloads/index.htm#DWSP), but due to its infrequent and irregular schedule, these results are not terribly useful.
Votes in favour: 100%
Degree of contention:
Very Low
There are 12 comments:
posted Aug 10, 2011
Ph, water temperature, total coliforms, ecoli, lead, copper, arsenic, nitrites and nitrates wold be good to have too, I'm sure.
posted Aug 10, 2011
Come to think of it, for interesting analyses, you would need to have those data for both source water and treated water.
posted Aug 10, 2011
Hi, a request has been made to the Drinking Water Services Branch for water testing results. It is great to have these specific expectations for when I meet with them, i.e. turbidity, flow, etc., and any bacteria or protozoa tests in the treated water, Ph, water temperature, total coliforms, ecoli, lead, copper, arsenic, nitrites and nitrates.
I do not know what the data looks like, but this helps to direct the request. If there are any other specifics please post them here, and I will provide the results of my inquiry when I have them.
Thank-you,
Robert Giggey | OpenData Lead | City of Ottawa
posted Aug 11, 2011
There are two dimensions to consider: one is the contaminants for which the water is tested (as mentioned above), and the other is where the water samples are taken. There are three relevant sample locations: source water, treated water leaving the treatment plant, and, distribution system water. For each of those locations, you should get the test results for all the contaminants (if available).
posted Aug 16, 2011
Thank-you, this is great information. I will be following up on each of these (different groups).
posted Aug 22, 2011
The results for source, treated water, and distribution for the past 10 years should be up within the next couple of weeks. It should include all of the data points identified in the comments above.
posted Sep 1, 2011
We've recently posted 10 years worth of test results, which include the source, plant, and distribution testing results, and I believe all of the indicators listed above (or at least what we have records of).
http://ottawa.ca/onlineservices/opendata/info/drinkingwaterdataen.html
posted Sep 6, 2011
Hi, I'm sorry but I'm getting a 404 error from that URL. (http://ottawa.ca/onlineservices/opendata/info/drinkingwaterdataen.html)
Do I need to log in somewhere or something?
posted Sep 6, 2011
Hi Norm, sorry, here is the correct link:
http://ottawa.ca/onlineservices/opendata/data/drinkingwater_data.zip
posted Sep 7, 2011
Thanks Rob! Much obliged.
Note that the URLs are getting italicized between underscores, so the actual link is
http://ottawa.ca/online[underscore]services/opendata/data/drinking[underscore]water[underscore]data.zip
posted Sep 7, 2011
Hi Rob,
The data appear to be annual summaries. That's a great place to start, but is there any way of getting the individual (daily?) test results?
Thanks again!
posted Sep 20, 2011
Hi Dave, unfortunately at this point we can only provide the annual summaries through the opendata site. This is a technical/cost issue rather than a policy issue.
I will however, keep this request on the list of data set requests (published monthly on ottawa.ca/open), so that it doesn't get forgotten.
Thank-you,
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