Development of monitoring program for water safety in small-scale water treatment plants in rural areas of Ecuador

Sammanfattning: Globally a major health concern according to the World health organization (WHO, 2011) is gastro-intestinal infections caused by fecally contaminated water. The access to drinking water has increased due to international efforts, however the long-term sustainability and safety of the water accessed have gained criticism, and many water sources have proven to be both contaminated (UN, 2016) and badly managed (WHO, 2016a).  This thesis aims to design a monitoring program for small-scale water treatment in order to make the water supply sustainable in terms of providing safe water in a long-term perspective. A case-study was conducted for three treatment systems under constructed in rural Ecuador. The monitoring program design was based on a literature review and conducting a quantitative microbial risk assessment (QMRA). QMRA is a tool for estimating microbial risks, by using quantitative data on microbial contamination and estimating health risks. Data for the QMRA was gathered from literature and in field, and the reference pathogens used in the QMRA were E.coli O157:H7, Rotavirus and Giardia. In order to estimate infection risk from drinking water consumption for the community a QMRA-model called MRA, developed by Abrahamsson et al. (2009) was used.  Observations of the catchment areas and measurement of water quality regarding aspects other than microbial contamination indicated that the main risk was microbial contamination from fecal contaminations in the catchment area. The results from the QMRA indicated that the treatment using chlorination reduces E.coli O157:H7 under the acceptable risk level of 1/1000 infections per person and year, while the systems using biosand filters (BSF) are more effective in reducing rotavirus and Giardia. If the BSF are combined with chlorination the annual probability of infection caused by consumption of the treated water per year and person was 0.42/1000 for E.coli O157:H7, 570/1000 for Rotavirus and 25/1000 for Giardia.  The resulting monitoring program was divided into two parts: one part aimed to prevent contamination and one part designed to measure pH, temperature, conductivity, turbidity on a weekly basis and microbial indicator tests using a presence/absence method monthly. Additional testing is to be done in case of events of such character that the water quality could be effected, for example an extreme weather event.  It was concluded that the designed monitoring program could help improve the water quality in a long-term perspective, but it is dependent on the possibilities to get the necessary support, especially in the implementation phase. Recommended further studies includes collection of more site-specific data to make the QMRA results more representative, and evaluation of the monitoring program design by implementing it and optimizing it in the communities.