Potable Water Treatment Study Group

This weeks readings dives into the parameters for measuring quality of freshwater and assessing it's "health". Keep in mind this is for freshwater, not drinking water. You would hope there'd be no BWMP for drinking water ;-) .

Assessing freshwater quality is a massive effort in urban watersheds, especially as the human populations in such catchments not only divert from it, but expell into it. The industrial actions of far-off populations also affects the quality of watersheds through weather dispersed pollutants. This adds a whole layer of complications to assessing quality and the sources of pollution that threaten it.

I live an an area on the pacific northwest (USA) with a notable history of intense watershed pollution. My city sits on the merger of two major rivers which flow to the Pacific and is a historical port of industrial commerce since Americans settled the west a few centuries ago (http://www.portlandonline.com/bes/index.cfm?c=32197).

I'd like to hear from everyone else about their local watersheds, especially those participants living in areas that have been settled for thousands of years (India, Europe, etc) and cantrast that with folks from places with a mroe recent history of euro/white settlement (Americas, Australia). I imagine the human impact on the local watershed has quite an intense history for both types of places.