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Participating in events that benefit our community is important to all of us at WETLAB. Below, one of our lab techs tells us about an event she participated in earlier this year benefiting the Food Bank of Northern Nevada.
CANstruction – March 5, 2015
Maiya Greenwood
CANstruction is a charity competition where participants design and build giant structures made completely from canned food. At the conclusion of the competition, all of the food is donated to the Food Bank of Northern Nevada. The participants range from engineers and architects to boy scout troops and school students. This year’s event was impressive, exciting and charitable! There were five categories: best meal, best use of labels, structural ingenuity, juror’s favorite, and an honorable mention.
“Scouting for Food”
Juror’s Favorite- “CANcraft”
Best Meal- “Castle Made of Dreams”
Best Use of Labels- “Give S’more to the Food Bank”
Nevada is home to many beautiful, expansive, and green golf courses. But, Nevada is also a dry, arid desert which is currently going through a severe drought, and there’s no end in sight. How are these two seemingly irreconcilable realities coexisting? Well, that’s a multi-faceted answer.
Golf courses go hand-in-hand with Nevada’s hospitality and luxury industries, and companies would be hard pressed to simply let their green investments die a brown, crunchy death. So companies, and courses, have gotten a little creative. While they started with the obvious measures of reducing overall usage, and examining pipes for leaks, the reduction was simply was not enough. Golf courses have now started using treated effluent water as a means for watering their massive lawns. Many courses in Nevada, especially those lining the Las Vegas strip, have used gray water for several years, but effluent water is a newer usage concept. Effluent water differs from gray water in that it must be more treated, since it can contain sewage. Using effluent water, instead of fresh water or even gray water, means a reduction of demand for potable water, which in turn means that our dwindling water supply can hold out a bit longer.
Northern Nevada golf courses have capitalized on the use of treated effluent water as a means to water their grass. It’s clear that the water-saving measure isn’t negatively impacting the golf courses, too, because the lawns are bright green and thriving. You just have to drive by Washoe County’s Sierra Sage Golf Course in Stead to see that this is a great way to water the turf. Sierra Sage gets their water from the City of Reno’s Stead Water Reclamation Facility, where the effluent water is treated to the point where it is no longer dangerous, but still not potable.
Another impact of this ever-worsening drought? Shorter winters mean more time on the putting green.
WETLAB tests effluent water for EPA compliance, and water for golf courses is no exception. WETLAB will also test all of your runoff and fertilizer samples, call (775) 355-0202 for more information.
Effluent water could soon become part of your normal drinking water in Northern Nevada. According to KTVN, reclaimed water is around 30% cheaper than potable water, but the problem is that waste water is not drinkable yet. Yet is the key word here, because regulations that define how much the water will need to be treated are working their way through the Nevada state legislature, and lawmakers are hoping to see them adopted by the 2017 session.
As everyone knows, Northern Nevada is suffering a severe drought. Having another way to reuse water will have a great, positive environmental impact on our already low waterways. Effluent water is already being used in some ways, mostly to irrigate parks and golf courses, but more could be put back into eventual use by the proposed measure. The process involves injecting semi-treated water directly into the ground, so that it will later make its way back into our pipes. This will ease the strain that is currently put on the Truckee River, which will in turn help with our ecosystem.
Effluent water is defined as waste-water, whether treated or not, that flows out from an industrial treatment plant or sewer. Secondary effluent is that same water that has been treated, but not to the point of purity. Obviously, the main difference between potable and effluent water is the cleanliness of the water, and its fitness for human consumption.
WETLAB preforms several tests on effluent water for many different clients, including public and private companies. Some of these tests are Biochemical Oxygen Demand (BOD), which tests how much oxygen demand the effluent water has, and Total Suspended Solids (TSS), which tests the amount of suspended solids within an aqueous sample. Several other tests are often performed in tandem on effluent water samples, including Total Nitrogen, Nitrate + Nitrite, Ammonia, Total Phosphorous, and Fecal Coliform. These tests all provide a detailed profile of what exactly is contained in an effluent sample, and allow proprietors to know how to best treat their water.
Singapore and Texas have already implemented effluent-to-drinking-water purification systems, with positive results. To read more about this program in Nevada, and to see an interesting news report on it, click here.
We are in the process of tripling the space of our semi-volatile organics lab!
Construction is expected to be done mid-August, with the expansion fully functional (hopefully!) by the end of September. The expansion will nearly triple the square footage of Bruce’s lab, and the new equipment will essentially double capacity. The new instrument is a GCFID, which is for running TPH analysis (and could in the future run alcohols, gylcols, and qualitative, not just quantitative, TPH), and will be used to do just extract-ables, with the old GCFID being relegated to just purge-ables. In the old lab, where the instruments currently are, a six-foot fume hood will be installed, and all instruments will be in the expanded area. This new area will have six “instrument stations,” with counter space and vents, but only three will be used for right now. This is exciting news because this means there are further opportunities for growth!
This week, TPH and HAA5 sample results may be a bit late, but all result and sample flow will return to normal right after that! This expansion will help WETLAB nearly double our sample capacity, and will give Bruce some much needed space in his lab!
For questions and queries, please call our client services department at (775) 355-0202.
According to a recent article in the Tahoe Regional Planning Agency’s Tahoe in Depth Newsletter, the clarity levels of Lake Tahoe are improving. Lake clarity increased due to several factors, high among them being the continuing drought. Lower amounts of precipitation means less runoff into the lake, which means that fewer pollutants find their way into Tahoe’s waters. The extreme regional drought has brought a small glimmer of good news, but that news pales in comparison to its terrible effects elsewhere. However, if we focus on the bright side, Lake Tahoe clarity levels are at a decade long high.
Water clarity in Lake Tahoe is measured using a Secchi Disk. The Secchi disk is a white disk that is lowered into a body of water. The clarity measurement is then obtained by seeing how far the Secchi disk can lowered into the water while still remaining visible. In Lake Tahoe, the clarity has historically been remarkable, with data suggesting clearness to approximately 120 feet. While the lake is nowhere near that clear now, currently hovering around 70 feet, it is still a measure of how the lake is currently faring in its ever-expanding use.
Water clarity is an important indicator of lake health. One of the reasons for Lake Tahoe’s remarkable clarity is due to the amount of rain that falls directly on the lake. Approximately 40% of rainfall that contributes to the lakes watershed is directly onto the lake itself. This is a very large amount of water that does not have to flow into the lake via runoff, meaning that the clarity is not negatively impacted.
Several measures have been taken to increase Lake Tahoe’s clarity levels, including the very popular “Keep Tahoe Blue” campaign (more information can be found here). Another important tactic is the institution of the Lake Tahoe Total Maximum Daily Load, which WETLAB has previously written about here.
Rob is the team lead for the Geochemistry lab at WETLAB. He joined the WETLAB team two years ago, after he moved to Reno from New Jersey. Rob holds a B.A. in Chemistry from Rutgers University, and has a myriad of technical lab expertise.
Rob came to WETLAB with several years of lab experience under his belt. He previously worked in research at Church and Dwight (the Arm & Hammer company), where a project that he helped work on eventually made it to market. After, he worked for third party pharmaceutical company, called DPT, working in a clean room (which is why he sometimes drops things on the floor and doesn’t pick them up). After that, he worked at American Assay doing acid digestions and quality assurance.
The Geochemistry department at WETLAB runs many different EPA methods, including MWMP (Meteoric Water Mobility Profile), Flashpoint, Cyanide Extraction, and HCT (Humidity Cell Test). The HCT lab consumes much of his time, as it includes several different tests for each cell, each week. Since beginning his tenure at WETLAB, Rob has made several improvements to the functioning of the geochemistry department, including completely changing how ABA (Acid-Base Accounting) is preformed, so that WETLAB will better comply with NDEP rules and regulations.
At WETLAB, we specialize in finding innovative and unique solutions to client needs. This holds especially true in the Geochemistry department with Rob at the helm. For example, non-percolating HCT’s have been moved to paint trays to ensure both timely and accurate analysis. Per client request, Rob preformed several consecutive MWMPs (which is a procedure usually only preformed once), resulting in the generation of 25 samples from 5 samples of rock. Several other requests have been heeded, including making special standards for corrosion tests, and preforming net carbon and percent organic and inorganic carbon value analysis. Client satisfaction is one of our highest priorities at WETLAB, and we provide inventive solutions while maintaining our standard level of precision and accuracy.
Rob prepping the LECO for analysis.
