Our First Priority Is to Provide Customers With High Quality Water
Your tap water meets or exceeds all Federal and State drinking water health standards thanks to our full-time staff of water quality professionals who diligently monitor and safeguard your water supplies 24/7.
State Certified Operators. MCWD's Operations and Maintenance team is composed of highly certified drinking water professionals who are on the job every day to ensure that your water continually meets quality standards.
Extensive Quality Testing. Before the water reaches your tap, it is sampled and tested along every step of the water's journey to you. Testing begins with the groundwater itself, which is checked at the source wells, and again after disinfection. In total, up to 2,000 or more tests are performed per year to ensure all water is meeting water quality standards.
Independent, State-Certified Laboratories conduct all the District's testing. These test results are automatically reported to the State, where they are confirmed and tracked.
Disinfection for Quality. Small amounts of chlorine provide protection against potential disease-causing organisms.
Automated Monitoring and Backup Systems for Reliability. Additional testing, backup power, and automated monitoring systems ensure that the entire water system is working properly, so you always receive quality water.
We test for over 200 substances and can detect as little as 1 drop of a substance in 500 billion drops of water.
Approximate Equivalence:
Consumer Confidence Report (CCR)
As our customer, you have a right to know what your water contains and where it comes from. If you are interested in examining the water quality results, please review the latest version of the annual Consumer Confidence Report (CCR) in English here; this report is also available in Korean, Spanish, Tagalog, and Vietnamese.
If you have questions about water quality: please contact our Customer Service Department at (831) 384-6131.
Intensive Sampling of All Drinking Water Quality Standards
The District collects and analyzes regulatory water samples, which monitor compliance for over 200 constituents in the drinking water. Many of these constituents are naturally occurring substances. The water supply samples are tested for general minerals such as calcium, magnesium, and hardness; inorganic chemicals such as arsenic, chromium, and other metals; organic chemicals such as solvents, pesticides, and herbicides; radioactivity, including radon. The distribution system is also tested for disinfection by-products by testing for total trihalomethanes (TTHMs) and haloacetic acids (HAA5's).
Our regularly scheduled water sampling program and prudent operations and maintenance team ensure that your water meets all State and Federal drinking water standards.
More Information About Water Quality
The United States has some of the safest public water supplies in the world. Our drinking water is treated and monitored to ensure that the water being delivered is safe for consumption. While our water is safe, drinking water quality and management are understandably complicated. Slight traces of naturally occurring or man-made substances can sometimes find their way into tap water, as summarized below.
Ten Bacteria Tests Each Week. The District samples for coliform bacteria (Total and E.coli) in the distribution system every week as a part of our routine sampling program. Samples are collected from state-approved distribution system locations, consisting of ten routine samples per week; a different set of ten is analyzed each week.
Hardness. Due to the mineral content that is naturally present in the groundwater, there is increased water hardness. While there is no drinking water standard for hardness, the District continues to monitor the hardness scale of samples collected throughout the year.
Whether you have a tankless or tank water heater, the District recommends flushing your water heater regularly as per the manufacturer's recommendation to help avoid mineral deposits which can build up over time and significantly reduce the life of your water heater as well as cause some water quality issues.
Lead and Copper. The District samples for Lead and Copper on a triennial basis, as required by the State Water Resources Control Board, Division of Drinking Water. Compliance with the lead and copper action levels is based on the 90th percentile lead and copper levels. This means that the concentration of lead and copper must be less than or equal to the action level in at least 90% of the samples collected. The District collects a minimum of 30 samples from customers' sinks every three years and analyzes them for lead and copper. While the District cannot control the lead and copper levels once the water leaves the service main, the District does work with homeowners and property managers to create a "find-and-fix" approach to reducing the levels of lead and copper. The District was below the action level at the 90th percentile for both copper and lead in its latest sampling event in 2022.
To learn more about the Lead and Copper Rule (LCR), please visit: https://www.waterboards.ca.gov/drinking_water/certlic/drinkingwater/leadandcopperrule.html
Trichloroethylene (TCE). TCE was a common solvent used by the U.S. Army on the former Fort Ord. TCE has been detected in wells 29, 30, and 31 at low levels, with the average level from the source wells at 0.4 parts per billion (ppb). This is far below the Public Health Goal (PHG), which is determined by a level that would not cause significant adverse health effects in people who drink the same water every day for 70 years, is 1.7 ppb for TCE. The Maximum Contaminant Level (MCL), which is the maximum level of a contaminant that can be within the drinking water, is 5 ppb for TCE. The District continues to monitor for TCE in its water supply regularly.
Per-and-Poly-Fluoroalkyl Substances (PFAS). When the former Fort Ord was in service, the U.S. Army used foaming agents with PFAS to put out fuel fires. Thousands of chemicals fall under the PFAS umbrella. Currently, four specific analytes have State required Notification or Response levels: Perfluorooctanoic Acid (PFOA), Perfluorooctaniesulfonic Acid (PFOS), and Perfluorobutanesulfonic (PFBS), none of which have been found in any of the District's source water wells. The District performed PFAS testing in all wells, and well 29 has been found to have low levels of Perfluorohexanoic Acid (PFHxA). All other wells were non-detect for PFAS chemicals that have been sampled.
Thinking About PFAS In Drinking Water from the Water Research Foundation
More information about PFAS from the State Water Board
More information about PFAS from the US Environmental Protection Agency
Monitoring Data for Constituents Without Standards. The District also samples for a series of unregulated contaminants, which are those that do not yet have drinking water standards set by the EPA. The purpose of monitoring unregulated contaminants is to help the EPA decide whether the contaminants should have a standard for monitoring. Every five years, the EPA issues a new list of unregulated contaminants that need to be monitored by public water systems; these lists are denoted by UCMR, or Unregulated Contaminant Monitoring Rule, and the version that is currently being used. The District conducted sampling for the UCMR4 reporting, which requires monitoring between 2018 and 2020. To view the results from the UCMR4 study, please click here. To view the results from the UCMR3 study (monitoring between 2013-2015), please click here.
District Cross-Connection Actions Protect Water Quality
A cross-connection is an actual or potential connection between any part of a potable water system an an environment that would allow substances to enter the potable water system. This usually involves contamination from outside the potable plumbing system siphoning backwater into the potable water pipes. The District has performed several cross-connection surveys within its service areas. Where a degree of hazard has been identified, a backflow prevention devices must be installed and maintained to comply with Title 17, California Code of Regulations, Federal Safe Water Act of 1974 and the District's water code. Backflow prevention assemblies are essential as they prevent potential contamination of the drinking water from backflow or back-siphonage conditions. Backflow prevention assemblies must be tested annually or anytime a device is newly installed/repaired or is actively leaking.
More about cross-connection and backflow prevention is available here.
The U.S. Army is Cleaning Up Shallow Groundwater Plumes of TCE Within the Former Fort Ord Lands
The Army operates a network of shallow groundwater monitoring wells to track the progress of the TCE cleanup efforts. The U.S. Army groundwater monitoring wells do not supply drinking water to District customers..
More information on the Army's ongoing cleanup
More About about MCL's and PHG's
2023 Monthly Water Quality Reports – Bacteria & Chlorine Residuals (PDFs)
Previous Years Quality Reports – Bacteria & Chlorine Residuals (PDFs)
Previous Years Quality Reports – List of Non-Detects (PDFs)
| 2021 2022 |
This notice is being sent to you by Marina Coast Water District. California State Water System ID#: CA2710017