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What are Contaminants?
 A contaminant is a technical term for anything detected
other than water. It is natural for drinking water to contain some contaminants, and San Antonio
Water System is no exception. But the presence of contaminants in drinking water and even bottled water does not necessarily indicate that water poses a health risk.
Sources for drinking water (both tap water and bottled water) include rivers, lakes, streams, ponds, reservoirs, springs and wells. As water travels over the surface of the land or through the ground, it dissolves the naturally occurring minerals and, in some cases, radioactive material, and can pick up substances resulting from the presence of animals or from human activity.
TCEQ has completed an assessment of SAWS source water and results indicate that some of our sources are susceptible to certain contaminants. The sampling requirements for our water system are based on this susceptibility and previous sample data. Any detections of these contaminants can be found in this report.
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Contaminants that may be present in source water include:
- Microbiological contaminants, such as viruses and bacteria which may come from sewage treatment plants, septic systems, agricultural livestock operations and wildlife. Cryptosporidium is an example of a microbiological contaminant affecting surface water sources.
- Inorganic contaminants, such as salts and metals which can be naturally-occurring or result from urban stormwater runoff, industrial or domestic wastewater discharges, oil and gas production, mining or farming;
- Pesticides and herbicides, which may have a variety of sources such as agriculture, urban stormwater runoff and residential uses;
- Organic chemical contaminants which are by-products of industrial processes and petroleum production and can also come from gas stations, urban stormwater runoff and septic systems and;
- Radioactive contaminants, which can be naturally occurring or the result of oil and gas production and mining activities.
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For more information on source water assessments and protection efforts at our system, please contact us at (210) 704-SAWS.
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