EWMRU
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City water to keep flowing
Theresa McManus, The Record
Published: Saturday, July 28, 2007 (3pages)
Royal City residents won't have to go without water when disaster strikes.
City council has approved $130,000 for the purchase of an emergency water mobile response unit from Key Water and Air International Inc. in Nebraska.
The cost includes delivery and setup.
"This puts us at the forefront in emergency preparedness in British Columbia," said Coun. Bob Osterman, chair of the city's emergency advisory committee. "It's money we are putting upfront, hoping we don't need to use it."
Osterman noted that this device would have been useful last summer when Tofino residents were left without drinking water when their reservoir ran dry.
"This same unit could have been taken there."
Coun. Betty McIntosh suggested staff should develop a policy for lease opportunities if other communities are in need of the unit for drinking water.
Mark Gajb, manager of risk, safety and emergency planning, began pondering how the city would provide drinking water to residents following a disaster after seeing how some people in New Orleans were left without drinking water for five days following Hurricane Katrina.
While he was part of a regional committee looking at the issue of providing drinking water in an emergency, he also began exploring initiatives that New Westminster could pursue on its own.
"Clean drinking water is one of the most essential needs of a population subsequent to a disaster," said a staff report.
"It is required for human survival as well as for washing wounds and treating the injured. In Metro Vancouver, there is significant potential for drinking water sources to become contaminated after a significant earthquake."
The unit being purchased is completely self-sufficient and is located in a trailer that can be pulled to any location to draw water.
Potential sources of water include the Fraser River, the Brunette River and Canada Games Pool.
After being presented to council for its consideration last year, approval of the emergency water mobile response unit was put on the back burner while alternative water sources were considered.
"I am ecstatic we are getting it," said Gajb, who believes that emergency preparedness serves the city well on numerous fronts.
"That attracts business, that attracts people with money. If they are going to set up shop, they can set up somewhere that is prepared. It may never happen. You can find other uses for it."
The unit is equipped with one, 12,500-Watt generator, which could be used for various needs.
"It is not limited to providing drinking water," Gajb said. "There's a lot more to this unit than providing drinking water in an earthquake - $130,000, that is a relatively inexpensive bang for your buck. It has the ability to save people's lives in a disaster."
According to a staff report, the unit has a sophisticated, eight-stage filtering process that includes ozone injection, UV radiation and reverse osmosis. It can literally filter out any chemical or bacteria that could cause harm to humans.
Gajb is going to suggest that the city compile an inventory of private swimming pools that could also be used as water supply in the event of an emergency.
He said the pools could be an alternative if Canada Games Pool cracked and that water source was lost, or the rivers were inaccessible due to infrastructure failures.
"I like to be really thorough, have every angle covered," Gajb said. "You have the river, you have the Canada Games Pool. You may as well throw private swimming pools into the mix."
In addition to generators, the unit comes with a heating/fan unit to allow the device to function normally and independently in freezing temperatures or extremely hot weather.
"They customized it for New Westminster, they customized it for Canadian winters," Gajb said. "We will be the first in Canada again."
New Westminster is believed to be the first municipality in Canada to have its own emergency radio station, which is located at 88.7 FM.
"This is huge in terms of the causing ripples in the pond," Gajb said. "Word has gotten out that we are getting it."
Gajb has been contacted by several communities interested in seeing the unit in action or wanting more information about the device.
"There is a lot of interest, now that we have made the first move - $130,000 is a drop in the bucket for the awareness and profile," he said. "At the end of the day, we have a unit that can provide drinking water for the whole city."
The unit has been built in Norfolk, Nebraska and will be sent from California later this month, after undergoing a final inspection.
Ernie Wilmink, president of Key Water and Air International, will be accompanying the device to New Westminster and training local officials in use of the emergency water mobile response unit.

© The Record (New Westminster) 2007

Emergency Unit Passes Through Yreka
By: Jamie Gentner
Daily News Staff Writer
Thursday, July 19, 2007 Vol. 147 No. 138 (2pages) Yreka, California
www.siskiyoudaily.com

Yreka- An Emergency Water Mobile Response Unit made its way to British Columbia last week, but not before making a stop at Ozotech, Inc. in Yreka for some tinkering and a visit with Yreka Police Chief Brian Bowles.

The unit is used in case of an emergency like an earthquake, hurricane, fire, flood or terrorist attack that contaminates a water source or makes water unavailable to city residents.

For instance, when Katrina struck New Orleans, city residents had to drink flood water that was flowing by them. With the help of an EWMRU, they would have had 5,760 *20 oz) bottles of water in the first hour. Every known chemical has been charted in a manual onboard the unit.

The filtration system inside has the ability to take those chemicals out of river water or water from another source and produce 21,000 gallons of water a day, without using and putting any chemicals of its own into the environment.

“Every county should have one of these systems, without a doubt,” said Ernie Wilmink, creator of the mobile unit and president of Key Water and Air International, Inc. in Lindsay, Neb. “It may not happen today, but at some point, it should be something everyone gets. You can live a week without food, but you can’t go long without water, so a hit to drinking water would be very detrimental. You need to be prepared for that.”

Now seven years and hundreds of thousands of dollars later, Wilmink has created a tool to help people be prepared for that.

Inside the custom-made trailer with special rims and tires are walls with six inches of insulation to keep the trailer warm. Lighting lines the unit because, Wilmink joked, “disasters always tend to happen at night.”

A 12,500-watt generator runs the unit that is filled with tanks used to filter water.

When an emergency arises, first, a hose is run from the unit to a water source. Then, the filtration process begins. Water goes through sand and Mircro Z filtration before going to the ozone oxidation/disinfection system. Filtration is finished with multimedia and carbon filtration, reverse osmosis and ultraviolet disinfection. The water finally runs out through a spigot.

According to a pamphlet distributed by Key Water, the unit “supersedes the required health code standards for maximum contaminant level goal (MCLG) and maximum contaminant level (MCL).”

Part of the system that does that is made by the Yreka-based business Ozotech, Inc., which has been in the area since 1986 and ships ozone technology all over the world, including places like Taiwan and Ukraine.

Wilmink met President Kenneth Mouw of Ozotech when they served on the Water Quality Association task force together. Both have a passion for ozone technology and decided to make it mobile for the first time ever.

According to the pamphlet, “Ozone: Back to Nature” by Ozotech, ozone is a natural purifying and oxidizing agent similar to fluorine and one-and-a-half times stronger than chlorine. It destroys bacteria, viruses and other waterborne microorganisms 3,000 times faster than chlorine. After ozone has disinfected, it reverts back to its original form of pure oxygen.

“It’s natural. We just have to learn to harness it and put it to work,” said Kathleen Hoag, director of manufacturing of Ozotech. “Ozone helps out Mother Nature, and to put it in a unit like this is an amazing opportunity.”

Chief Bowles was impressed with the unit and said it should be on the Homeland Security Wish List.”

“It’s great to see a local business  involved in the production of such a unit,” he said. “I don’t think it’s something the city could afford on its own, but it’s definitely something the county should look at. I will definitely present the idea to the Homeland Security Committee because, if the unit really does what it promises, I think it would be a great asset to any community.”
For more information about the EWMRU, call 1-800-539-6220. To find out more about Ozotech, Inc. or ozone technology, call Kathleen Hoag at 842-4189.

Norfolk, NE Business Builds Unit To Clean Polluted Water In Disaster Zones

Imagine being able to take water from a lake, a pond, or a river... and turn it into drinkable water in just a few minutes. One northeast Nebraska man doesn't have to imagine it... he's built a device to make it possible. Ernie Wilmink is the President of "The Key" water and air international of Lindsay Nebraska. His business along with Arkfeld manufacturing of Norfolk has recently completed the first ever emergency water mobile response unit. The mobile unit, complete with a 12,500 watt generator, is able to produce 21-thousand gallons of approved drinking water in a day. "The output of this unit means that you could fill up roughly six thousand bottles of 20 ounces per hour," said Ernie Wilmink, "The Key" Water and Air Int. The process starts when you drop your hose into the polluted water source. Then the water is pre-treated and sent through two pre-filtration systems. Then comes the heart of the operation, ozonation, which has never been made mobile before. "But when you realize what the capacity of ozonation to compare it, it's about four thousand times faster than the chlorine is," said Wilmink. The water is then sent through two after filtrations, reverse osmosis and finally through ultra violet light. The end result, is approved pure drinking water. The response unit also comes with a portable disinfection system which also uses ozone technology. Wilmink says his inspirations for the project included hurricane Katrina, recent visits to Africa and most recently the devastating tornados in Kansas. "And you take a disaster like that and you have to truck in all that bottled water, hand out all these 12 packs or whatever," said Wilmink. "You compare the cost of that and transportation and everything that is involved with having a unit and providing you with that amount of water capacity." One system has already been sold for just under 100-thousand dollars and two more are on order. Wilmink says he hopes to expand the operation in Norfolk which could double the number of employees at Arkfeld Manufacturing. KTIV.com Updated: May 21, 2007, 7:00 pm