The Safe Drinking Water Act of 1974, 1984, and 1996 (SDWA) Andrea Sun Period 5 4/22/11

SDWA It was passed by Congress in 1974. The law was amended in 1986 and 1996 National Under SDWA, EPA sets standards for drinking water quality and oversees the states, localities, and water suppliers who implement those standards. To protect public health by regulation the nation’s public drinking water supply.

Regulation Congress amended the SDWA to require EPA to publish a list of unregulated contaminants to monitor every five years.  These unregulated contaminants are suspected to be present in drinking water, but for which no health-based standards exist.  The contaminants for which EPA now requires monitoring represent 28 chemicals and two viruses.  EPA selected these 30 from a list of 7,500 unregulated contaminants.  These unregulated contaminants include pesticides, biological toxins, disinfection byproducts, commercial chemicals, and waterborne pathogens.  The reason the 30 chemicals were chosen was because they could be monitored using currently available technologies or methods.