Information about Taste & Odor

Many customers of Indianapolis Water may be experiencing taste and odor issues due to naturally occurring algal blooms in White River.  Some of the algae produce taste and odor compounds (MIB and Geosmin) that may cause an earthy/musty taste and smell in the water.  Water remains safe to drink, but many customers may certainly notice a difference from the regular supply.

Sampling has traced the origin of the bloom to the Prairie Creek Reservoir near Muncie.  Based on staff experiences over the past 30 years, this is the earliest and largest taste and odor event they have seen to date. 

Last year, the utility received 12 calls regarding taste and odor issues from surface water in Morse, Geist and Eagle Creek.  Yesterday, we received 91 calls about the White River event. Historically taste and odor issues have occurred in the reservoirs which supply smaller treatment plants. However, approximately 70% of our service territory may currently be impacted due to river flow, which provides surface water to our largest plant at 16th Street, as well as White River North at 118th and River Road. 

To date, we have increased well water usage at both plants (which mixes with the surface water supply), and worked to wield water from other treatment plants throughout the distribution system. On Monday we received permission from IDEM to further modify our treatment processes in an effort to better combat the situation. Those modifications should result in higher levels of removal of the compounds, based on our past research and development work at the T.W. Moses facility (at Eagle Creek).

Our staff has been working very hard to mitigate the impact to customers and will continue to report on progress regarding the treatment modifications.  This is a naturally occurring phenomenon and the water remains safe to drink.

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