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Legionella Monitoring

As part of a comprehensive water management program, facility managers must regularly monitor for conditions that can produce legionella bacteria. This bacteria thrives in stagnant water and warm temperatures and may cause a severe form of pneumonia when inhaled or ingested. It’s vital that facilities monitor water flow and quality to minimize hazardous conditions that can lead to legionella growth and put tenants at risk of serious infection.

What Is Legionella?

Legionella is a bacteria that can cause legionellosis (Legionnaires’ disease), a severe form of pneumonia, when inhaled or ingested. According to the Mayo Clinic, Legionnaires’ disease causes inflammation of the lungs. It can also cause infections in wounds and other parts of the body, including the heart, which may be fatal.

Why Monitoring For Legionella Is Important

Compromised Water Quality & Health Hazard: Building water systems continue to be the leading source of legionella bacteria, due to water stagnation and warm temperatures. Because legionella can grow and multiply quickly in potable water systems and survive chlorine treatment in utility water treatment plants, it’s crucial that facilities managers invest in consistent testing and treatment solutions.

Legal Responsibility: In most states, building owners and facilities managers have a legal obligation to assess and control the risk of exposure to legionella bacteria. They must ensure their water system is monitored and tested accordingly to prevent legionella outbreaks.

Creating a Water Management Program

Facilities managers are encouraged to create a water management program to monitor water flow and quality routinely. The program is designed to help minimize hazardous conditions that can lead to legionella growth, especially stagnant water. Because disinfectants can dissipate quickly from stagnant water, the opportunity for biofilm bacteria and potential pathogen growth, like legionella, increases substantially. This toolkit from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) provides more information on developing a water management program to reduce legionella growth and spread.

Internal Building Factors That Can Lead to Legionella Growth

Scale and Sediment: Materials that use up disinfectant, creating ideal conditions for legionella and other bacteria growth.
Biofilm: A biological community of bacteria that grow on moist surfaces and can protect legionella from disinfectant and heat.
Water Temperature Fluctuation: Fluctuating water temperature can put your system at higher risk of bacteria growth.
Insufficient or Excess Disinfectant: Too much or not enough disinfectant can compromise water quality and allow bacteria to grow out of control.
Water Stagnation: Reduced water use and building occupancy often results in water stagnation or standing water. This lowers disinfect levels, promotes biofilm growth and reduces temperature, resulting in unsafe water quality.
pH Level: Testing pH levels is important to understand the effectiveness of your disinfectant. Normal pH levels should measure between 6.5 and 8.5.

External Building Factors That Can Lead to Legionella Growth

Water Quality Changes: Water quality changes can lower disinfectant levels, increase sediment and turbidity and cause unbalanced pH levels. As disinfect levels change, water management programs should be reassessed.
Construction: Changes in water pressure or vibration from a construction site can displace biofilm, allowing legionella to permeate the water in your building.
Water Main Breaks: If a water main breaks, biofilm can dislodge from the pressure and free legionella into the water. Additionally, sediment, dirt and other materials can enter the water and use up disinfectant more quickly.

Solution Areas

Heating, Ventilation & Air Conditioning (HVAC)
Water Services & Plumbing

Heating, Ventilation & Air Conditioning (HVAC)

Integrating flow meters within HVAC applications can help you effectively monitor for water stagnation. It’s imperative to place meters in areas where stagnation commonly occurs, including:

Hydronic Systems: Stagnation can happen throughout a closed energy loop, where a source receives the liquid, heats or cools it and supplies it to a load that needs heating or cooling. This process can increase the likelihood of legionella growth and spread the bacteria throughout your system, including to your cooling tower blowdown and make-up water applications.

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Water Services & Plumbing

Flow meters aid facility managers in detecting low or no flow within their piping systems to identify water stagnation and in measuring backflow. Meters should be installed in the following areas to monitor stagnation:

Cold Water Lines: Carry water throughout facilities and can spread legionella-producing bacteria if water stagnation is not monitored. Additionally, it’s vital that facility managers flush these systems before re-opening buildings after extended shutdowns or vacancies to protect tenants. Commonly affected areas include bathrooms and effluent sewer lines.

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Flow Metering Solutions

Flow meters are needed to measure areas of low or no flow, which can create ideal conditions for legionella growth and lead to contamination that spreads throughout your system. Below are our top solution recommendations:

Clamp-on Meters

Clamp-on meters are a suitable choice for flow measurement throughout your system because service is never interrupted, making them especially ideal for retrofit applications. Meters simply clamp on to the exterior of a pipe and do not require a plumber for installation. A single person can easily install clamp-on meters, including the Dynasonics^® TFX-5000 Ultrasonic clamp-on flow meter and the Dynasonics^® TFX-500w Ultrasonic clamp-on flow meter.

In-Line Meters

In-line meters are another great option for flow measurement. They require cutting the pipe for installation and provide reliable performance in facility water management systems, measuring low flow rates and improving accuracy. In-line meters are the go-to choice for new installations, during scheduled maintenance activities and in situations where pipes are oversized. The ModMAG^® M2000 Electromagnetic flow meter, Dynasonics^® U500w Ultrasonic flow meter, Recordall^® Industrial Disc Series flow meters and Recordall^® Industrial Turbo Series flow meters are all suitable options in monitoring flow within your facility.

AquaCUE^® Flow Measurement Manager

In addition to connecting flow meters to your facility water management system, you can also connect meters to AquaCUE^® Flow Measurement Manager. Using cellular network infrastructure, this cloud-based analytics system delivers a powerful dashboard solution to provide facilities with increased visibility and help better manage their water use.

Water Quality Solutions

Water quality monitoring products play an important role in identifying if water conditions are suitable for legionella growth. Solutions from ATi and s::can measure the food available for legionella bacteria and indicate if the water chemistry is right for the bacteria to thrive.

ATi Solutions

ATi is a trusted global supplier for the pharmaceutical and healthcare industry, helping medical facilities around the world manage their disinfection requirements and maintain a clean, safe water supply through a wide range of water quality sensors and monitoring solutions.

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s::can Solutions

s::can solves water quality challenges for hospitals, senior living facilities, offices and water treatment facilities. Their solutions provide real-time intelligent data creating safe water within your facility, measuring a wide variety of parameters from chlorine to total organic carbon (TOC).