House committee asks LDH to review statewide chlorine residual policy after debate on health, costs

The House Health and Welfare Committee on May 28 voted to report House Concurrent Resolution 54, asking the Louisiana Department of Health to conduct a comprehensive review of rules requiring a 0.5 milligram-per-liter chlorine residual in public water systems.

Representative Desotel introduced the HCR, saying she has sought documentation from LDH about why the 0.5 standard has remained in place since an emergency rule in 2013 and asking that LDH “review and revise regulations regarding the minimum required chlorine concentration in public water systems.” The committee adopted a technical amendment clarifying that treatment needs differ between surface water and groundwater.

The resolution grew out of concerns raised by residents and water operators from rural parishes who said the uniform 0.5 requirement raises operating costs for small systems, worsens staining and manganese problems, and can increase disinfection byproducts such as trihalomethanes (THMs). Jerry Smith, a former state health employee who said he worked on water regulation for decades, and Randall DeCote, public works director for Avoyelles Parish and an operator for local systems, urged a system-specific review. DeCote told the committee that “because we have to treat the chlorine at such a high residual, it’s costing the water systems a lot of money,” and he said smaller systems are stretched thin by the current standard.

LDH’s interim chief engineer, Karen Benjamin, told the committee the 0.5 mg/L level was recommended in 2013 by an advisory team convened after amoeba-related deaths and was chosen because studies showed the organism is killed at that residual within about an hour of contact. Benjamin said testing in distribution systems showed that lower residuals (0.2 mg/L) could require more than 24 hours of contact time for 99% eradication in the absence of biofilm or sediment and that detections in distribution systems were generally associated with little or no chlorine at the point of detection. She also said LDH has previously provided materials to legislators and that the department has received an estimate of about $250,000 from a third-party consultant to perform a statewide study.

Several technical points were emphasized in testimony and committee discussion: LDH staff said iron and manganese occur naturally in many groundwater sources (they told the committee about roughly 500 systems statewide with elevated iron/manganese), and any oxidant such as chlorine will oxidize those metals and can make them visible, requiring sequestering or specialized removal treatment. Witnesses warned that increasing chlorine can increase THM formation when organic matter is present; committee members and speakers referred to federal actions that have reduced the total trihalomethane standard from 100 parts per billion to 80 parts per billion as part of a broader regulatory picture.

Representative Jackson moved to report HCR 54 with the adopted amendment; there were no objections and the measure was reported favorably. The resolution asks LDH to perform a comprehensive review with input from independent scientists, environmental health experts and local water authorities to assess whether the 0.5 mg/L requirement remains justified across all system types.

The committee record captures both the department’s rationale tied to fatal Naegleria fowleri detections in 2013 and the operators’ concerns about brown water, manganese-related staining and higher operating costs. The committee did not adopt prescriptive technical remedies; instead it asked LDH to assemble the evidence and recommend system-appropriate approaches.