United States
      Environmental Protection   Office of Water               EPA 811 -F-95-001
      Agency              4603                     January 1995

      FACT SHEET - ANALYTICAL

      METHODS, FINAL RULE

Purpose

     The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) revises or replaces
compliance methods for measurement of contaminants in drinking water
based on user suggestions, changing regulatory needs and improvement in
technology. In this action, EPA is promulgating the use of updated and/or
new methods  and withdrawal of older methods.  The rule is expected to
eliminate unnecessary duplication by withdrawing older versions of the same
method, and satisfy drinking water industry's request for approval of new
technologies in drinking water analyses.

      The action will contribute to,the Agency's efforts not only towards
cost reduction but also towards pollution prevention, personnel safety, and
waste minimization.

Statutory Authority

      EPA's promulgation of specific analytical techniques for compliance
measurements is authorized under the Safe Drinking Water Act,
Sections 1412 and 140K1MD).  Periodically, the Agency withdraws approval
of outdated methods, updates older methods, and approves new methods.

Summary of the Notice:

      In this regulatory effort, the Agency is approving 12 new methods,
withdrawing approval of 45 methods, and updating 79 older methods.

      EPA is approving twelve new methods whose performance is at least
 as good as already approved methods.  Forty of the forty-five methods being
 withdrawn are redundant or obsolete.  Most of these methods are for
 inorganic contaminants, and are published by EPA. These methods are

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identical or nearly identical to methods published by the Standards Methods
Committee or the American Society for Testing and Matenals (ASTM). The
EPA methods are now obsolete, unacceptable or unnecessary, because they
have not been updated as frequently as ASTM and Standard Methods. One
method is being withdrawn because it has been withdrawn by the Standard
Methods Committee.  Four methods are being withdrawn because they use
equipment, procedures or reagents that are no longer available or that have
been found to be more hazardous or cumbersome than EPA originally
predicted. Reduction of solvent volumes and removal of potentially
hazardous reagents and procedures from the methods conform with the
pollution prevention, personnel safety, and waste minimization goals of the
Agency.

      Seventy-nine of the methods affected by this rule will be replaced with
slightly modified and improved versions of the same methods. The
modifications and improvements are based on public and Agency experiences
with older versions of the methods.  In several cases, methods have been
 modified to eliminate or sharply reduce the amount of organic solvent used in
 the analysis.
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      This rule would not change any of the acceptance limits for
 performance evaluation samples, and would not change required monitoring
 frequencies.  Since this rule would allow laboratories to use fewer method
 versions for a greater number of contaminants, laboratory and State
 transaction^ costs should be reduced. The drinking water industry is
 expected to favor approval of these changes. The analytical laboratories wiH
 particularly welcome withdrawal of cumbersome or hazardous methods, and
 approval of new technology methods.

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