National Water Quality Month is dedicated to making the most of the relatively small amount of freshwater because having clean water is vital to our health and the needs of our environment. At Phenomenex, we take great care in water quality, so this month is particularly important to us.

While Phenomenex is involved in many different scientific industries, we’re also in the water quality monitoring business. We offer many products and techniques for analyzing drinking water, surface water, groundwater, and wastewater to comply with regulated and unregulated contaminants. Some examples include: Strata™ PFAS SPE products, Phenova™ Certified Reference Materials, and other PFAS workflow solutions.

In the U.S., water quality is protected by The Safe Drinking Water Act (SDWA) and the Clean Water Act (CWA), the two important environmental laws governing water regulations. These laws require the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to set regulatory standards and approve analytical methods for testing drinking water and wastewater discharged to surface water. If you need help with your water analysis that complies with new EPA regulations, we offer Strata PFAS WAX/GCB extraction cartridges and Phenova PFAS CRM native standards for both EPA methods 533 and 537.1.

“Phenomenex products are used in these analytical methods developed worldwide to meet water quality standards,” says Richard Jack, Ph.D. Global Market Development Manager – Food and Environmental.  “There are standards for well-known contaminants such as Polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAH), polychlorinated biphenyls (PCB), gasoline, and plastics. And emerging contaminants are receiving more attention as we learn more about their prevalence and toxicity.”

There are easily thousands of factors that can harm the quality of your local water source ranging from industrial pollutants like metals, particulates, oils, and other chemicals, to the pesticides we use in our own backyards. To the everyday person, hearing that there are water standards for PAH or plastics may not mean anything. But by learning about the impacts of water quality, you can understand the crucial role our products play in safeguarding the environment and our health, from making sure the chemicals used to combat wildfires don’t contain PFAS which can contaminate the environment and our drinking water, to ensuring that the medicines we use do not harm the environment.

National Water Quality Month reminds us to take a moment to consider how important these water sources are—not just to humans, but also to the other inhabitants in our ecosystems. At Phenomenex, we’re proud to do our part and support our customers in ensuring they’re meeting vital water standards.