One-day Pass Offers Taste of 2021 Convention – allows access trade show, education sessions on Friday, July 30
A Friday-only 2021 WQA Convention and Exposition pass offers access to morning education sessions and the trade show on the final day of the July 28-30 event in Las Vegas, NV. The pass, available only for Friday, July 30, allows flexibility for those unable to attend all three days of the water treatment industry’s signature event.
The pass is $125 for WQA members or $195 for non-members and offers full access to all convention events occurring the final day of convention. The exhibition opens at 9 a.m. that day and runs for five full hours, until 2 p.m. The morning also offers several education sessions – two of which offer Continuing Professional Development credit toward recertification – and the manufacturer/suppliers section meeting, which is an open forum to discuss issues of comment concern among those in that section of WQA membership.
Three different education sessions are offered from 8 to 9 a.m. PDT on Friday:
- Considerations When Using RO for Boiler Feed-Capital vs. Operating Costs, led by Peter S. Cartwright, MWS, PE, and offering 0.1 CPD.
- Crisis Management: Lessons Learned from a Pandemic, a panel discussion on all aspects of crisis management including dealership management, media relations, human resources and marketing and how we can use what we learned in the midst of the pandemic to better prepare for any crisis. The panel is moderated by Candice Wentling, MWS, Director of Certified Action and features Amanda Crangle, Founder of Lamplight Digital Media; Doug Ramer, MWS, CWR, President of Martin Water Kinetico; Wes Bleed, WQA’s Membership, Marketing & Communications Director and Irma Bishop, MWS, Area Manager of Hall’s Culligan.
- Solving Water Treatment Problems with the Water Treatment Pros, is a discussion stemming from the Water Treatment Pros Facebook group, whose 1,900 members support each other by asking questions and sharing ideas on tackling issues in water treatment. It offers 0.1 CPD and is led by David Emmens, Technical Training Manager at Pentair and Facebook group moderators Jennifer Smith, CWS, and Kelly Thompson, MWS, CI, of Moti-Vitality.
Visit the convention registration page for more information on the Friday pass or to register for the entire convention. Those who attend the full convention – either in-person or virtually – receive two more days of education sessions, committee and section meetings; can attend the Opening General Session, which features industry outlooks, leadership awards and a keynote speech by influencer Simon T. Bailey and have virtual access to recorded in-person sessions plus a full slate of on-demand education available to all registered convention attendees.
For nearly 50 years, the WQA Convention and Exposition has been the signature event of the water treatment industry. Imagine is the theme for 2021, the first live WQA gathering in nearly two years because of the coronavirus pandemic. See wqa.org/convention for full details.
WQRF funds additional contaminant occurrence analysis – 99 new analytes, sample location analysis could inform Contaminant Occurrence Map
WQRF’s Contaminant Occurrence Project will add statistical analyses for 99 more analytes and a sample location analysis for all records in the database under a project recently approved by the Water Quality Research Foundation. Carleigh Samson, PhD, and Chad Seidel, PhD, of Corona Environmental Consulting will lead the project, which builds upon their previous work that populates the WQRF Contaminant Occurrence Map.
“This work will provide more insight on the concentrations of contaminants that we didn’t get in the first phase of work, including several PFAS compounds, and grow the already robust database,” said WQRF Contaminant Occurrence Map Task Force Chair Gary Hatch of Hatch Global Consulting Services. “The project reports and interactive map offer water treatment professionals – and consumers as well – access to so much powerful information. I’m happy to see this project continue to grow.”
National statistical summaries will be provided for all 99 analytes, including several PFAS compounds, and state-by-state statistical summaries will be conducted for TOC, radon, strontium, fluoride, calcium, magnesium, glyphosate, hexavalent chromium and 1,4-dioxane. The quality control and quality assurance work includes establishment of a consistent unit of measure for each analyte’s data records and identifying questionable data records due to non-sensical units, missing units, conflicts between below detection flags and measured results, and other issues. The sample location analysis will differentiate raw water samples from finished water samples, which is of particular importance for some of the aesthetics or secondary contaminants.
The work is expected to be complete by September 2021. It is one of several WQRF-funded projects now under way. Details of other WQRF research is available at wqrf.org.