Title: Using Operations Research to Reduce Security Risks in American Drinking Water Systems (2009 CSRI Summer Lecture Series) Speaker: William Hart, Sandia National Laboratories Date/Time: Wednesday, July 8th, 2009, 3-4pm (MST) Location: CSRI Building, Room 90 (Sandia NM); 915/S145 CA Brief Abstract: Reliable, clean water is critical for maintenance of public health, protection of public infrastructure and the operation of key industries. This presentation will discuss how operations research has been used to reduce risks in American drinking water systems. The U. S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is the lead federal agency for the security of drinking water, responsible for providing information and technical assistance to the more than 50,000 water utilities across the country. The distributed physical layout of drinking water utilities makes them inherently vulnerable to contamination incidents caused by terrorists. To counter this threat, EPA is using operations research to design, test, and deploy contamination warning systems (CWS) that rapidly detect the presence of contaminants in drinking water. In this talk, we will show the EPA's presentation for the Franz Edelman Award. The Franz Edelman competition recognizes and rewards outstanding examples of operations research as it is practiced throughout the world. In 2008, the EPA's submission was a finalist for the Franz Edelman Award. The EPA formed a collaborative team of industry, academia, and government, which has demonstrated that CWS are cost-effective, timely, and capable of detecting a broad range of contaminants. Widespread application of these new systems will significantly reduce the risks associated with catastrophic contamination incidents: the median estimated reduction of fatalities for the nine utilities already studied is 48% and the corresponding reduction of economic impacts is over 19 billion dollars. As a result of this operations research program, online monitoring programs, such as CWS, are now an accepted technology for reducing contamination risks in drinking water systems. CSRI POC: Zhaofang Wen, (505) 284-0206 |