Improved Acceptable Solutions are easier to understand and use
The Water Services Authority - Taumata Arowai has published updated Acceptable Solutions for three common types of smaller drinking water suppliers
Every day, drinking water suppliers play a vital role supporting the health and wellbeing of people across New Zealand by providing them with safe drinking water.
The Water Services Authority – Taumata Arowai (the Authority) regulates drinking water suppliers to ensure they meet their legal responsibilities and provide safe drinking water.
The Authority is working to make compliance easier for drinking water suppliers including providing different compliance options.
Acceptable Solutions are a possible compliance option for some rural supplies and those that serve 500 or fewer people. As a result, they may be of particular interest for rural and community supplies, which provide drinking water to an estimated 17% of people in New Zealand.
Acceptable Solutions provide a set of requirements that suppliers can follow to meet key legal responsibilities. A key feature of Acceptable Solutions is that they enable water to be treated to make it safe near the buildings where people will drink it. This could include using an ‘end-point’ treatment system, which uses a filter and ultraviolet light to disinfect the water.
Today, the Authority has published three updated Acceptable Solutions, following consultation earlier in the year.
The three Acceptable Solutions now available
The updated Acceptable Solutions are for three common types of smaller drinking supplies:
- mixed-use rural supplies (at least 50% of water supplied is for farm use (e.g. irrigation, stock) and up to 50% is provided for people to drink)
- small and medium-sized networked supplies
- self-supplied buildings (e.g. cafes, schools and marae that supply their own drinking water).
Authority Head of Operations, Steve Taylor, says this is an important update for the sector.
“We believe that the changes we’ve made mean that more suppliers can use this straightforward and cost-effective way to meet their legal responsibilities to provide safe drinking water to their community.”
He said that using an Acceptable Solution was a viable alternative for some suppliers compared to completing a drinking water safety plan and following the Drinking Water Quality Assurance Rules.
“With these changes, we’ve also provided small households and private workplaces (supplying 25 or fewer people) the option of using lower cost treatment systems to produce safe drinking water – noting that all treatment systems used as part of an Acceptable Solution must meet basic safety standards.
“Where drinking water is provided to people at a public building such as a café or community buildings like schools or marae, a validated treatment system (i.e. one that meets an internationally recognised safety standard) is required to safeguard public health,” he said.
“It just takes one bacteria or protozoa (microscopic parasite) in drinking water to make someone sick. Our vision is of a future where everyone in New Zealand has safe water when they turn on the tap.
“Ultimately, the Acceptable Solutions released today aim to encourage more suppliers to install drinking water treatment systems, so that more people have safe water to drink every day.”
Steve Taylor said the consultation provided invaluable feedback.
“I want to thank everyone who took the time to review and comment on the proposal that we released in May. The improvements we’ve made were directly informed by feedback we received from people across the water sector and wider community,” he said.
For more information