Water quality issues are an ongoing concern for any surface water source.
Our water supply is no exception. Cranby Lake is a living and dynamic habitat, affected by many factors which are not within our control: climate, wildlife, and other environmental influences make providing safe drinking water a challenge at best.
The images below show what goes on at our lake in the warmer months.
The units indicated in the images are temperature of air and water (in Celsius), turbidity (in NTUs – the goal being less than 1 NTU), and total coliforms. Coliforms are a measure of the organisms in the water which indicate changes in water quality. Not all coliforms are harmful, but they give us an indication of the probability of the presence of dangerous organisms.
Click images below to view larger version.
What you can do to help:
Conserve water – especially during hot, dry weather. Excess water use only compounds the problems. Conservation will reduce demand on the source, reduce the volume of water (and turbidity) entering the intake at the lake, reduce flow through the lines which creates more turbidity, and ultimately, reduce the total amount of turbidity in the water that impairs our chlorination efforts.
Please read our page Water Conservation. Using less water per household will increase water quality for everyone.