Water in the West: Part 3 Partner Website

Part 3:

WHAT TO KNOW ABOUT PARK CITY’S WATER QUALITY

by Cassidy Mantor

WHJ strives to be a valuable resource in building your home and designing your life in Park City. In the spirit of that mission, we’re digging deeper and presenting a third installment of our inquiry into Water in the West. After taking a high level look at water supply and hearing from landscape design and irrigation experts as to how best to conserve water for a sustainable future, we are now honing in on water quality, a key concern of citizens – both full-time and part-time residents – according to the 2024 Utah State University’s Utah Wellbeing Project.

Participants in the wellbeing project survey rated their quality of life from 1-5 with 1 being worst and 5 best. It comes with little surprise that Park City got 4.22, putting it in the top three participating resort/rural communities in Utah (Emigration Canyon topped the list and Midway came in second.) Suffice it to say, there is an overwhelmingly positive attitude for life in Park City. Leisure time and a connection to nature are obvious sources of satisfaction.

Having established an overall positive state of wellbeing in town, 86% of survey respondents expressed concerns about water supply, and 78% about water quality. Two years ago, authorities found low levels of PFAS – forever chemicals – in Park City’s well water. Park City’s water quality professionals determined the PFAS were likely from fluoro ski wax since the highest concentrations were around nordic skiing and alpine resort areas.

Park City’s iconic skier lifestyle was contaminating its local water.

Michelle De Haan, Park City Municipal Corporation’s Water Quality and Treatment Manager, has over 30 years of experience working with the EPA to remove heavy metals and address water quality issues. As they were trying to identify the source of the PFAS in Park City’s water, De Haan and her team found a paper in a scientific journal that examined the correlation between fluorinated ski wax and PFAS. It was written by an assistant professor of environmental studies at Colby University, Gail Carlson. Carlson was also a parent of a Colby ski racer who was concerned for her child’s wellbeing as well as the health of the environment. Similar inquiries had been published in Norway and Sweden, and last year a study found PFAS on Austrian ski slopes.

As awareness develops for the connection between ski wax and forever chemicals, leading ski and snowboard organizations are beginning to enforce bans on the use of fluoro wax. It’s banned now at the Olympics and at the World Cup, and it is also banned by the U.S. Ski and Snowboard Association as well as collegiate racing associations. Several states including California, Colorado, Maine, New York, and Vermont have legislation and proposed legislation that bans the manufacturing or sale of goods with PFAS, but the bans are generally limited to food or cosmetics items as well as apparel (Gore-TEX and many waterproof clothing items have it). Colorado approved a ban on the sale of PFAS ski wax that will become effective in 2026, and come 2030, Maine will have the country’s first unilateral ban on the sale of non-essential goods containing forever chemicals.

---

HOW PARK CITY TOOK ACTION

“With a population of 8,500 people, we’re considered a small water system in EPA’s eyes,” De Haan says. Although it is “small,” Park City has three unique water treatment plants and three different city wells and water sources. The city is fortunate to have its choice of water supply – something unheard of in many western towns.

The city’s new 3Kings water treatment plant is an $80 million plant that treats water from Park City’s most unusual drinking source abandoned mine tunnels that drain water from the mountainside. “When miners were seeking their fortunes in the late 1800s, they hit groundwater while they were digging,” De Haan explains. “They diverted that water into tunnels that became the city’s first drinking water sources. Today, we have invested in a state of the art treatment plant that removes eight different metals to virtually non-detectable levels to protect human and fish and wildlife health.”

According to De Haan, the tunnel waters treated at 3Kings are the headwaters of the local watershed, and they have no PFAS. Park City’s second water supply is surface water from the PFAS-free high-mountain Weber River that is treated at the Quinn’s Junction treatment plant, a microfiltration plant that removes pathogens. The 3Kings and Quinn’s Junction treated waters can be mixed with well water to ensure EPA’s new PFAS limits can be achieved, but since the 3Kings plant has been online, they have not had to utilize well water. “Park City has active management in place for our drinking water’ which means we would use those wells affected by PFAS as our last sources,” De Haan says.

While Park City has been in touch with other ski towns in the country, De Haan shares that those towns have not been able to conclusively report that ski wax has caused their PFAS. She notes that people have been touring their treatment plants recently. She says, “Sharing our best practices opens other peoples’ eyes to the complexity of water quality challenges.”

“when miners were seeking their fortunes in the late 1800s, they hit groundwater while they were digging. They diverted that water into tunnels that became the city’s first drinking water sources. Today, we have invested in a state of the art treatment plant that removes eight different metals to virtually undetectable levels to protect human and fish and wildlife health”

–Michelle De Haan, Water Quality and Treatment Manager, Park City Municipal Corporation

---

LEADING BY EXAMPLE

“When we learned our groundwater wells had been contaminated with PFOS and PFAS, we scratched our heads trying to determine how these chemicals got into our high mountain watershed,” De Haan shares. “We thought maybe from fire-fighting foam, but the fire station is newer and fire fighters don’t train there. They haven’t used the AAAF foam that produces PFAS, so we did more investigation. As a ski town, we were paying attention to the news when they banned fluoro ski wax before the last Olympics. We read the Colby study, sampled our water and snow, and verified that PFAS compounds in Park City well water and snow matched those found in Colby’s study, so we banned fluoro wax city wide by ordinance.”

The city also collaborated with Recycle Utah and created a take back program wherein 600 pounds of fluoro wax was turned in and incinerated by French environmental treatment conglomerate Veolia, the only company to date that has proven to effectively eliminate the chemicals.

“As a ski town, we were paying attention to the news when they banned Fluoro Ski Wax before the last Olympics. We read the Colby study, sampled our water and snow, and verified that PFAS compounds in Park City well water and snow matched those found in Colby’s study, so we banned Fluoro Wax city wide by ordinance.”

–Michelle De Haan, Water Quality & Treatment Manager, Park City Municipal Corporation

To strengthen awareness in the community, they created a public education campaign with radio spots and signs with the message “Please ski fluoro free”. “Our largest challenge with that is that we can’t control the thousands of people who come ski here each year from outside of our local environment,” De Haan says.

The city’s prompt response is indicative of why community ranked so high on the wellbeing survey and why, as more people choose to make Park City home, heightened awareness about the environment will make for a sustainable future for all. “The outdoor industry is challenged with PFAS in general, and they’ve done a good job offering environmentally friendly replacement products,” she shares. REI recently committed to being PFAS-free. SWIX makes a fluoro free line, and a new wave of environmentally friendly brands like Wend and Purl offer biodegradable options. It would make a real difference if Utah issued a statewide ban.

---

STEPS YOU CAN TAKE AS A HOMEOWNER

In addition to not using fluoro wax on alpine and nordic skis and boards, there are several steps homeowners can take to protect their homes from PFAS in the water.

FILTERING WATER USING REVERSE OSMOSIS OR GRANULATED ACTIVATED CARBON.

• Reverse osmosis removes contaminants by forcing water through a semipermeable membrane.
• Any appliance or filtration system must be certified to remove PFAS and kept in accordance to any maintenance plan outlined by the manufacturer.
• “It’s important that household filtration systems are managed based on their operating and maintenance protocols,” De Haan informs. “If you don’t change out your reverse osmosis or carbon filter on the frequency it’s required, you can inadvertently create a bacterial environment within your household.”
• Select Samsung and LG refrigerators are certified to remove PFOS/PFOA, as are several countertop, under sink, and faucet mounts.

FLUSHING THE LINES OF YOUR VACATION HOME TO BRING IN A FRESH WATER SUPPLY.

• Property managers can do this for homeowners while they’re away to keep the water fresh in the house. “When the water goes into an unoccupied place, chlorine in the City’s water dissipates and homeowners can inadvertently create a bacterial environment without even knowing it,” De Haan shares. “If you don’t flush your home, you can compromise the quality of your household water.”
• If your home’s water hasn’t been used for months, the old water sitting in the pipes can smell, change color, and start growing bacteria. All water using appliances including dishwashers, faucets, toilets, spas, and hot water heaters should be “flushed” with fresh water be fore use. Specific steps are outlined on parkcity.org’s public utilities water division page. Homeowners are responsible for their water quality beyond the meter and flushing the old standing water out to let fresh water in is an important step to have the highest quality water in the home after periods of non-use.

The way Park City is handling its water quality issue is a testament to the strength of Park City’s local government. In fact, in the last year Park City’s Public Utilities Department was awarded Polco’s 2023 Voice of the People Award for Transformation in Utilities, an honor bestowed upon local governments that best engage residents and include public opinion in community decisions.

The EPA anticipates enforcing compliance by 2027 since it just issued proposed legislation in 2024. With the measures Park City has taken and continues to take to ensure its citizens have clean drinking water, it is an exemplary thriving destination resort town that has prioritized sustainable growth and the wellbeing of those who make it home.

De Haan drinks Park City’s tap water, sharing, “I personally trust in our superior water quality and drink straight from the tap every day.”

---

whj SPECIAL FEATURE