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Water Quality Surveillance and Response

Resources to Design and Implement Sampling and Analysis for Surveillance and Response Systems

These products support the design and implementation of Sampling and Analysis (S&A), a component of a Surveillance and Response System (SRS).

  • Water Laboratory Alliance provides tools and resources for water utility, environmental, and public health laboratories, enabling them to support water utilities during emergencies.
  • Environmental Response Laboratory Network is part of the Integrated Consortium of Laboratory Networks that ensures laboratories and resources are available for responding to incidents of national significance involving chemical, biological, and radiological agents.
  • Selected Analytical Methods for Environmental Remediation and Recovery is a resource that identifies analytical methods for use by laboratories that analyze environmental samples following incidents involving chemical, biological, and radiological agents.
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  • Guidance for Building Field Capabilities to Respond to Drinking Water Contamination (PDF)(66 pp, 4 MB, January 2017, EPA 817-R-16-001)
    Provides guidance for drinking water utilities to plan for and implement field activities that support sampling and analysis in response to drinking water contamination emergencies. To access customizable documents and supplemental information contained in this guidance, download the file onto your computer and open it in Adobe Reader or other PDF viewer programs. From anywhere in the guidance, you can return to a previously viewed page by pressing the ALT key with the left arrow key.
  • Building Laboratory Capabilities to Respond to Drinking Water Contamination (PDF)(64 pp, 1 MB)
    Provides guidance to assist drinking water utilities with building laboratory capabilities for responding to water contamination incidents. It presents contaminant classes of concern; lists analytical methods for contaminants from those classes; and provides information on the role of national laboratory networks in responding to drinking water contamination incidents.