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This paper discusses a methodology that has been developed to construct a pathogen budget fordrinking water watersheds, taking into consideration pathogen origin,deposition, inactivation and movement within a watershed. These processescan be described in terms of "stocks" (pathogens) and "flows" (movement ofstocks). In South-Eastern Australia, the majority of pathogen loads into majortributaries occurs during rainfall events so in-stream resuspension may not beimportant. In contrast, during dry weather the transit time within the studiedwatershed was sufficiently long such that in-stream processes becameimportant. Total pathogen unit (TPU) budgets were constructed for theparasitic protozoans Cryptosporidium and Giardia. This approach not onlyenables water utility managers to identify those watershed segments that arecontributing the greatest load of pathogens, but also where managementoptions should be most effective. With improved knowledge of pathogenecology this approach can be further refined to provide budgets of infectiouspathogen units (IPU). Includes 2 references, table, figure.

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Edition: Vol. - No. Published: 09/22/2002 Number of Pages: 6 File Size: 1 file , 250 KB