In a letter to CUC, DEQ Director Frank Rabauliman said the laboratory is maintaining full certification for the analysis of total coliform and E. coli through the Colilert Presence/Absence procedure.
“CUC laboratory is also granted full certification for the analysis of E. coli by the Colilert-MPN procedure,” he said.
The DEQ inspection is performed annually to ensure that the CUC laboratory abides by the Environmental Protection Agency’s manual for the certification of laboratories analyzing drinking water and the mandates of the CNMI safe drinking water regulations.
In a report to Rabauliman, CUC laboratory supervisor Heidi Yelin officer said the CUC “laboratory is clean, organized and well-equipped” and the “sampling and analysis, and QA records are neat and well organized.”
Moreover, the “laboratory staff are well-experienced and qualified to perform their assigned duties.”
Established in 1991, the CUC laboratory received its first certification in Nov. 1991 and began performing microbiological analysis of drinking water.
Each month, the CUC laboratory tests water samples from three CUC public water systems for total coliform and E. coli bacteria for compliance with the Safe Drinking Water Act.
“Throughout the year, we also test all the wells and springs for secondary water quality parameters-hardness or amount of calcium and magnesium, chlorides or level of salts, pH, temperature, conductivity, and total dissolved solids,” Yelin said.
“The CUC lab also tests the wastewater from CUC’s two wastewater treatment plants in accordance with the National Pollution Discharge Elimination Systems permits,” she added.
CUC Executive Director Abe Utu Malae said the achievement of the CUC laboratory should be credited to its regular consultations with DEQ’s safe drinking water branch and the hard work of its dedicated lab personnel.
“CUC could use more Heidi’s,” he said. “She just quietly gets the work done with her staff without goading or fanfare.”
