750 Liters of a Green Liquid

[dibbons]

Is there a hydrologist in the house? Seemingly overnight our city supplied water is not very transparent any longer.

What I understand to be well/ground water is pumped to this neighborhood every other night where we store it on rooftop plastic holding tanks. Household water is then gravity fed to the toilet, shower, and kitchen sink. The water never sees the light of day.

All of a sudden, the water this week has been green. I called the water company who sent out a half a dozen people (one lady in a white lab coat) to check out my report. They left after snooping around, only mentioning they did find a trace of chlorine in the sample I collected for them last night (that is, the last water that was pumped in from the street early this morning before they arrived). We have another property three blocks from here where I found green water also. We are located about 12 blocks from the water (Sea of Cortez).

The next door neighbor said he did not notice a recent color change, but he did say the water reeked of chlorine 5-7 days ago. When the same water is poured into a smaller container (five-gallon bucket) it does not look as green as it does in the larger holding tank.

 

[AJ/FormS]

Maybe it's the Sunlight, the end is near,lol.

 

[dibbons]

Theme for the next disaster film or a sequel to "The Green Slime" maybe?

 

[Bodyperson]

Looks like algea to me. No chlorine to kill it.

 

[ocdart]

Not to make light of your problem, but this kinda reinforces what I've always been told when visiting Mexico from SoCal..."Don't drink the water!"
The last time I was in Baja on a business trip just for the day, my boss and I had lunch in a nice restaurant in Tecate.
He had a drink with ice in it and a salad. He was sick the next day.
I had a bottled soda and soup. I never did get sick.

 

[dibbons]

The home-based water purification plants have become a common small business here (lots of competition),

 

[ocdart]

Looks like algea to me. No chlorine to kill it.

Agree. When I initially fill my pool (white plaster bottom and walls) here in SoCal it is a similar color green until I dump some chlorine in it to kill the algae. Do you have any swimming pool supply stores in La Paz that can do a water analysis?
Although safe to do so, we don't drink the city water here because of the taste. We use a Zero Water (ZEROWATER Water Filters Drinking Purification Filtration) filtered 30-cup container that we keep in the refrigerator as a source of cold water. Great taste!
We do cook using the city water supply.
When we go out to eat I've gotten in the habit of asking for water with a slice of lemon. Need something to kill the taste of most city water in the area.

 

[diymirage]

Not to make light of your problem, but this kinda reinforces what I've always been told when visiting Mexico from SoCal..."Don't drink the water!"
The last time I was in Baja on a business trip just for the day, my boss and I had lunch in a nice restaurant in Tecate.
He had a drink with ice in it and a salad. He was sick the next day.
I had a bottled soda and soup. I never did get sick.

he was in a town named after a beer, and he had a soda?

 

[dibbons]

It is really up to government agency here to supply clean water and to figure out what has gone wrong.

The mystery is how clear, clean water has been delivered for the past five years and now in the space of a week or so it suddenly looks like crap.

 

[Ddaddy]

It is really up to government agency here to supply clean water and to figure out what has gone wrong.

The mystery is how clear, clean water has been delivered for the past five years and now in the space of a week or so it suddenly looks like crap.

It’s an algae bloom that got ahead of them. The heavy chlorine in the water a few days ago and their comment about finding traces of chlorine today tells the tale.

Back when I worked at DuPont, we used to do a lot of work with municipal water suppliers and this happened more times than I can count. We used to sell them metric tons of ferric chloride to flocculate the algae and get it to precipitate out of the water supply so that the customers would never see it.

 

[Bodyperson]

It’s an algae bloom that got ahead of them. The heavy chlorine in the water a few days ago and their comment about finding traces of chlorine today tells the tale.

Back when I worked at DuPont, we used to do a lot of work with municipal water suppliers and this happened more times than I can count. We used to sell them metric tons of ferric chloride to flocculate the algae and get it to precipitate out of the water supply so that the customers would never see it.

Flocculate. A new word for me. Thanks.

 

[helliphinon8]

Must be sweet to romp your a body around La Paz. I'm in Az and we stay in a friend's condo down in Puerto Penasco every summer.....I've been thinking about taking my dart down there for a while now.

 

[Ddaddy]

Flocculate. A new word for me. Thanks.

If you want to know more or understand the basics, this video from MIT makes it simple to understand.

 

[ocdart]

he was in a town named after a beer, and he had a soda?

No, I had the soda. Lunch was during work hours and drinking not allowed per company policy.

 

[dibbons]

I tossed in 16 ounces of bleach, still the same shade of green after 10 hours.

 

[helliphinon8]

I tossed in 16 ounces of bleach, still the same shade of green after 10 hours.

You're in Mexico.......what'd you expect?

 

[Ddaddy]

I tossed in 16 ounces of bleach, still the same shade of green after 10 hours.

Bleach won’t remove the green color, but it will kill the algae. The dead algae needs to be flocculated and filtered out to make it go away.

 

[greymouser7]

You can send a sample of the water off to get tested. People test for lead all the time to protect their children. Send the results to the local news agency (paper/tv).

Publicity and a lawyer will give you leverage.

Save samples.

Best wishes!

 

[adriver]

I've worked in systems that the brown stuff it did flocculate.
I've worked in systems that the blue stuff it did triturate.
Nether one was pleasant, but I had to ate.

( "Eat" doesn't rhyme.)

 

[krazykuda]

Is there a hydrologist in the house? Seemingly overnight our city supplied water is not very transparent any longer.

What I understand to be well/ground water is pumped to this neighborhood every other night where we store it on rooftop plastic holding tanks. Household water is then gravity fed to the toilet, shower, and kitchen sink. The water never sees the light of day.

All of a sudden, the water this week has been green. I called the water company who sent out a half a dozen people (one lady in a white lab coat) to check out my report. They left after snooping around, only mentioning they did find a trace of chlorine in the sample I collected for them last night (that is, the last water that was pumped in from the street early this morning before they arrived). We have another property three blocks from here where I found green water also. We are located about 12 blocks from the water (Sea of Cortez).

The next door neighbor said he did not notice a recent color change, but he did say the water reeked of chlorine 5-7 days ago. When the same water is poured into a smaller container (five-gallon bucket) it does not look as green as it does in the larger holding tank.


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@4spdragtop

 

[j par]

In contrast our city water comes from Bull Run. It's so pure it doesn't even have minerals or anything in it.