Document Type

Article

Publication Date

3-2026

Abstract

This research seeks to determine whether health-based drinking water violations for total coliforms have increased since the Revised Total Coliform Bacteria Rule established in 2013 and fully implemented in 2016 by the Environmental Protection Agency under the Safe Drinking Water Act; as well as determine the geographic regions, states and territories in the United States with the highest number of health-based Total Coliform Rule and Revised Total Coliform Rule violations. We obtained data for drinking water violations involving total coliform bacteria from the Safe Drinking Water Information System for 2000-2019 and trend analysis was completed by state, region, water source, violation type, month, and year. Of 587,983 reported coliform violations, 124,977 were health based. Environmental Protection Agency Region 5, headquartered in Chicago, had the highest number of health based coliform violations (N=27,030), followed by Region 1, headquartered in Boston (N=17,771). Both Wisconsin and Michigan are within Region 5 and represent two of the top three states for health based violations, Wisconsin had the highest number of coliform violations of all states between 2000-2019 (N=7,022). Frequent acute violations occurred in ‘small water systems’ using groundwater, serving primarily rural populations.

Comments

This article is an unpublished manuscript

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