Friday, Apr 1 2011 9:26AM

With the help of a Community Development Block Grant, Utah's rural town of Fairfield was able to purchase the town's culinary water system and install a chlorination system to purify its water, reported the Daily Herald.

Town officials outlined the upgrades planned for the local water system at a recent council meeting. The newspaper said Fairfield used $142,946 of the $175,000 grant to buy the culinary water system from Fairfield Irrigation Company in December, which it then took over in January. The remaining amount was set aside for the construction of a chlorination system, repairs to water system services and a possible engineering study to construct a second-source well, reported the paper.

Before the new chlorination system was installed, the source said three state-monitored tests on Fairfield drinking water showed it had an unacceptable amount of bacterial growth. At the hearing, Councilman Mike Burch said the chlorine has fixed that problem. However, after inspecting the water system in January, the Utah Department of Environmental Quality Division of Drinking Water made several other recommendations for improvement, reported the source.

To meet those requirements, Burch said the town needs to certify a system operator, create a financial management plan and set up an emergency response plan for the water system.

Ninety-eight percent of public water supplies in the U.S. are disinfected with chlorine or chlorine-based compounds, according to the Water Quality and Health Council. The organization said the introduction of chlorine into the water purification process has had astounding benefits, including playing a key role in the dramatic rise in life expectancy that occurred during the twentieth century.