City’s drinking water routinely tests within safety limit
Dr. Johnny Wong has been a citizen of several municipalities, both nationally and internationally.
He now serves as an educator in the USF St. Petersburg Department of Environmental Science, Policy and Geography.
“St. Petersburg has a real culture of environmental awareness, and USFSP is a microcosm of that,” said Wong. “If people truly investigated the treatment and accommodations (for water), they would be impressed. The governments in the (Tampa Bay) area have done a good job creating a culture of safety.”
No city is immune to the fate of a lead-polluted water supply that has recently made headlines in Flint, MI. With only two main water sources — a contamination in one and budget cuts affecting the other — catastrophic conditions have taken cover.
But in St. Petersburg, there are a number of alternative sources.
Surface water streams down through the Alafia and Hillsborough Rivers, as well as the Tampa Bypass Canal. Groundwater is pumped through 11 well fields that draw from the Floridan Aquifer.
If a severe drought or contamination occurred, St. Petersburg Water Resources has two desalination plants that can turn seawater into potable freshwater. Though achieved at a high energy expense, the process is only implemented during emergencies.
“These desalination plants are so state of the art, Saudi Arabia has sent people to see the way we operate,” Wong said.
According to the city, St. Petersburg’s water is also well-treated.
Chloramines, an important type of disinfectant, are added to the water at a level of 4 milligrams per liter.
This is the Maximum Contaminant Level, the legal limit on the amount of a substance that is allowed in public water systems under the Safe Drinking Water Act. Substances detected at or below this number pose no known health risks.
Antimicrobials, agents that kill or inhibit the growth of microorganisms, are necessary to purify water sourced from surface and groundwater.
The latest Water Quality Report, published in April 2015, reported that levels of lead detected in a random sampling of St. Petersburg household taps were low and well under the safety limit advised by the Environmental Protection Agency.
However, the presence of lead in homes typically depends on the infrastructure of each individual house. Since many Florida homes were built in the mid-century or later, most are safe from containing lead plumbing pipes.
In spite of public information on city water supply, people continue to believe that drinking bottled water is better.
However, most bottled water is sourced locally.
“A lot of people drink Dasani or Aquafina or Zephyrhills, not realizing they’re all being bottled within the area anyway,” said Wong.
Information on how to test a home water supply for lead content can be found at
