One in 20 private water supplies were contaminated by E coli in 2020, an Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) report has found.

The EPA released the drinking water quality in private group schemes and small private supplies report on Tuesday.

Drinking water is provided by over 380 group water schemes to approximately 200,000 people across rural communities.

The EPA said that 20 out of 380 private group schemes had water contaminated by E coli, with over 2,900 people consuming this water.

There are also over 1,700 small private supplies, which include premises such as hotels, pubs and restaurants, crèches, nursing homes and national schools, that also provide water to staff, customers and service users on a daily basis.

Some 1,225 small private supplies were monitored, 49 of which were found to have E coli contamination in 2020.

These failures, at one in 20 private water supplies, are of significant concern and put the health of the consumer at risk.

Basic requirement

Commenting on the report, director of the EPA’s office of environmental enforcement Tom Ryan said that compliance with the E coli standard is "not as good as it should be".

"Meeting E coli standards is a basic requirement of safe drinking water," Ryan said.

He added that it is essential that works to improve water quality are carried out as soon as possible to eliminate the serious risks to people’s health.

"Water suppliers are obliged to make sure drinking water is clean and wholesome for consumers," he said.

Byproduct

Twenty-two of the 380 private group schemes also failed to meet the standard for trihalomethanes (THM), a byproduct of the chlorine disinfection process and formed where there is an excess of organic matter in the water source.

The report also shows that over one quarter of small private supplies, serving food businesses, nursing homes, crèches and B&Bs, were not monitored in 2020.

Programme manager of the EPA’s office of environmental enforcement Noel Byrne said: "We recognise that, in many cases, the failure to monitor these premises was due to difficulties in accessing premises during COVID-19 restrictions.

"However, it is vitally important that local authorities ensure all water supplies are monitored annually to provide assurance to consumers that their drinking water is safe.”

To address failures in drinking water quality due to deficiencies in infrastructure, the Department of Housing, Local Government and Heritage makes funding available through the Multi Annual Rural Water Programme.

The EPA has said that upgrade works should be progressed without delay at those private group water schemes which have been identified as a priority in order to improve the drinking water quality of these supplies.