A Bench-Scale Procedure for Evaluating Chlorine Bleach Inactivation of Bacillus Spores in Wash Water from a Cleanup of a Site with Biothreat Agents
Citation:
Gallardo, Vincente AND D. Feldhake. A Bench-Scale Procedure for Evaluating Chlorine Bleach Inactivation of Bacillus Spores in Wash Water from a Cleanup of a Site with Biothreat Agents. U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Washington, DC, EPA/600/R-18/296, 2019.
Impact/Purpose:
This document describes a bench-scale procedure for testing the efficacy of chlorine bleach for the inactivation of Bacillus spores in wash water generated during a cleanup of a site contaminated with Bacillus anthracis spores, the causative agent of anthrax. Full scale procedures exist for the treatment of such wash water with chlorine bleach, and these procedures have been tested and the results published. The published results were generated by testing the efficacy of chlorine bleach to inactivate spores using simulated wash waters. Although a wide variety of wash waters were created as part of the published research, one remaining concern is that wash water generated at a site cleanup is unique, different from the wash waters tested in the published research. Thus, one question that remains is how effective the full-scale inactivation procedures would be in the water generated at an actual cleanup site. To help emergency management personnel address this last question, a streamlined bench scale procedure has been developed for testing the efficacy of chlorine bleach for the inactivation of Bacillus spores in wash water actually generated during a site cleanup. The procedure is meant to be a practical resource that site personnel can consult when faced with the challenge of dealing with water from this type of cleanup. This procedure is not official EPA guidance on what must be done but is one tool that can be used with other resources for the handling of wash water that could contain B. anthracis spores.
Description:
This report describes a streamlined bench scale procedure which has been developed for testing the efficacy of chlorine bleach for the inactivation of Bacillus spores in wash water originating from a cleanup of a site contaminated with Bacillus anthracis spores.