Water quality
Water quality supply of urban territories remains a big problem. In the centralized water distribution systems, breakdowns, pressure drops and interruption of water supply are common, increasing the risk of secondary contamination of water and posing a  health risk. However, no data on this issue were available.
In sity of Chisinau, for example, water supply is effectuated from different sources: river Nistru and underground water. In 1998 the old system of piped water are increasingly under threat due to deterioration process and as a consequence loss of more than 30% of water (150 thous. m^3/day) in way to destination.
The same situation are in other sities. Consumption of piped water per capita in sities are very different: Vulcanesti - 64 l/day, Orhei - 180 l/day, Chisinau - 460 l/day. Avarage for the country is obout  300 l/day per capita.

The operators of water supply systems are responsible for regularly monitoring the quality of the water supplied to the consumers and its conformity with the sanitary standards (Instruction of MoH, 31 October 1995). Territorial Centres of Hygiene and Epidemiology perform independent controls. The Centres are the only agencies controlling the quality of water in decentralized systems (individual wells). However, they have insufficient capacity to test all existing wells annually. The standards allow up to 10 coliform bacteria to be detected in each 1000 ml of water (which exceeds the WHO Guideline of no detectable bacteria in each 100 ml of water).

The monitoring indicates that a substantial proportion of drinking water delivery systems does not meet hygienic standards (Table 10.2). The most common (some 80%) reason for disqualification is classified as "insufficient quality of water catchment area".

Table   10.2:  Monitoring of drinking water sources, 1996

 
Source:  Ministry of Health.

In some regions, the percentage of water samples exceeding health-related and chemical standards is very high (96% in Ciadir Lunga, 78% in Calarasi, 75% in Falesti and 71% in Slobozia).  Monitoring data from natural springs and fountains indicated that 69% of samples contained nitrates and ammonium nitrogen in 1993, compared to 62% in 1991 and 60% in 1992.  See also Chapter "Water" for the overall situation.

Water pollution
Water polution is major problem in sities areas. Domestic sewage and waste water from industrial and other economic activities are a major source of surface and groundwater pollution.  About 70% of the population is connected to municipal waste-water treatment plants, but most of the villages discharge their waste water without treatment.
 As exemple, in river Nistru downstream from Soroca, Camenca, Bender and Tiraspol, ammonia (up to 0.7 mg/l) and nitrogen (up to 0.2 mg/l) can be found as a result of residual water overflow that is insufficiently treated.  Also, increasing quantities of petroleum substances (0.08 mg/l), phenols (0.02 mg/l) and detergents (0.06 mg/l) have been recorded.
 

Source: Department for Environmental Protection, Institute of Geography of the Academy of Sciences

The total installed capacity for waste-water treatment is about 650 million m3/y, which includes 35 municipal waste-water treatment installations with a total capacity of 336.5 million m3 per year.  The plants are designed to reach a 60-70% reduction in biological oxygen demand (BOD).  In 1993, only 60% of the installations were functioning and there is no indication that the situation has improved since.  They do not work for a variety of reasons:

• many industries have stopped production because of the recession;
• maintenance and repair are too costly;
• many municipal waste-water treatment facilities have been overloaded by heavy metals because some industrial facilities do not work properly;
• in some rural areas, outdated facilities have stopped operation because their technical lifetime has been exceeded.