Proposed goal of 0.06 part per billion could force costly treatment on providers that get water from the heavy-metal-contaminated San Fernando Valley aquifer, including L.A., Burbank and Glendale.
California took the first step Thursday toward setting a drinking water standard for chromium 6 that could force cities and water districts to undertake costly treatment.
Also known as hexavalent chromium, the heavy metal is one of a number of industrial contaminants in the San Fernando Valley aquifer, a source of drinking water for Los Angeles, Burbank and Glendale.
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The communities now cut chromium levels by blending local groundwater with imported supplies. But the target concentrations proposed by the state are so low that sophisticated treatment would be necessary to meet them.
"We'd have to treat for it or we can't use the groundwater," said Bill Mace, an assistant general manager at Burbank Water and Power, which gets 40% to 50% of its supplies from the valley aquifer.
