Proposed Changes to Australian Drinking Water Guidelines 2011 (ADWG)
Date: 29-Jun-2017
The Australian Drinking Water Guidelines 2011 (ADWG) undergoes rolling revision to ensure it represents the latest scientific evidence on good quality drinking water. The National Health and Medical Research Council (NHMRC) is seeking public comment on draft text to be added to Chapters Six and Ten of the ADWG.
qldwater has been invited to make a submission to NHMRC about the proposed changes. As they largely relate to clarifying processes, rather than new guideline values, we do not intend to accept the invitation at this stage, however will do so if members raise any concerns. From the site:
The additional text has been proposed by the Water Quality Advisory Committee to clarify existing processes, and to facilitate the consistent interpretation of the ADWG.
Guidance on rounding
This draft text is proposed to clarify how the guideline values are derived for chemicals in drinking water, and how monitoring results should be compared with guideline values.
Guidance on parent compounds and metabolites
Occasionally Fact Sheets have been developed for the ADWG on particular chemicals (mainly pesticides) where the chemical likely to be present in water is an environmental breakdown product. In these cases, it is more appropriate for the Fact Sheet to be focused on the environmental breakdown product rather than the parent chemical.
The use of screening assays
This text has been developed at the recommendation of the WQAC, to clarify that screening techniques are legitimate analytical techniques for monitoring chemicals in drinking water, and details how the results should be interpreted.
The draft amendments and information can be obtained from the NHMRC public consultation website at http://consultations.nhmrc.gov.au/.
Any input or comments can be provided directly to Dave Cameron at qldwater – dcameron@qldwater.com.au.
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