Source Water Protection

Required by the Safe Drinking Water Act Amendments to protect public drinking water supplies, the Source Water Assessment Program requires states to: delineate source water protection areas for public water systems; identify the origins of regulated and certain unregulated contaminants in the delineated area; determine the susceptibility of public water supplies to contamination by sources inventoried. States are also required to describe how they will attempt to coordinate assessments of interstate waterways with other states, tribes and nations, known as the "maximum practical effort."

In 1997, ORSANCO initiated a work group to discuss interstate aspects of Source Water Protection Program activities for the Ohio River. The work group is comprised of representatives of state and federal drinking water agencies, including: Indiana Department of Environmental Management; Illinois Environmental Protection Agency; Kentucky Department of Water; Ohio Environmental Protection Agency; Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection; West Virginia Bureau of Public Health; U.S. EPA Regions 3, 4, & 5; and ORSANCO's Water Users Advisory Committee. As a result of work group meetings, ORSANCO agreed to develop an approach for states to delineate and inventory the 32 Ohio River surface water intakes. This approach would be incorporated into a report that could be appended to individual state source water protection program activities for the Ohio River.

Due to the size of the Ohio River, ORSANCO developed a tiered delineation system consisting of three protection zones. The purpose of this tiered approach is to define the level of source inventory within the Ohio River Basin.

Zone I	Zone II	Zone III
Zone of Critical Concern	Zone of High Concern	Source Water Area
Extends 1/4 mile below a water intake to 25 miles upstream in the Ohio River. The lateral extent includes 1/4 mile on both sides of the river bank and major tributaries.	Extends 1/4 mile below the surface of a water intake upstream, to 1/4 mile below the next Ohio River intake. The lateral extent includes all 14-digit hydrologic units adjacent to the banks of the Ohio River and major tributaries.	The entire portion of the Ohio River Basin upstream from a surface water intake.
All potential contaminant sources to a surface water should be identified and inventoried. Potential sources can be found using existing national, international, and state databases and through field verification.	Inventories should focus on existing databases and "localized" in-state resources to identify sources of contamination. Due to the size of this zone, a field component to identify sources of potential contamination is impractical.	Only critical areas of major activity need to be located. At a minimum, sources contained in US EPA's Envirofacts Warehouse Web page should be identified.

Ohio River states are responsible for performing potential contaminant source inventories for drinking water intakes within their respective boundaries. ORSANCO then coordinates an information exchange between neighboring states so that the interstate aspects of source water protection activities can be addressed. To facilitate a data transfer between states, a minimum requirements for available information on point sources of contamination was established. State agencies may choose to provide additional data beyond the minimum requirements.

Required Information for Point Sources

Facility Name
Facility Address
Facility Contact/Telephone Number
Facility ID Number
Facility NPDES Permit Number
Latitude/Longitude
Chemical(s) Released
Quantity Information
Standard Industrial Classification (SIC)

Resources for Interstate Source Water Protection Plans (.pdf)

Template for Ohio River System Source Water Protection Plans (.pdf)

ORSANCO Programs