Longyearbyen’s drin­king water: legio­nella and man­gane­se

For deca­des, most con­su­mers in Lon­gye­ar­by­en have pro­ba­b­ly not given much thought to their drin­king water. After all, it is drin­king water from the sur­roun­ding arc­tic natu­re, so sure­ly it should be clean? Even after inter­me­dia­te sto­rage in the arti­fi­ci­al lake Isdam­men in Advent­da­len or – depen­ding on the sea­son – in a drin­king water reser­voir on the out­skirts of Gru­ve­da­len. Of cour­se, the­re is also fil­te­ring and moni­to­ring.

The drin­king water lake ‘Isdam­men’ in Advent­da­len.

But the care­free tran­quil­li­ty around drin­king water has been over for a few months now: Legio­nella bac­te­ria have been detec­ted in drin­king water samples from Lon­gye­ar­by­en. This is initi­al­ly no reason to panic, as tap water that is com­ple­te­ly free of legio­nella is rather rare world­wi­de. It depends on the exact type of germ and its num­ber. Many Legio­nella types are harm­less to humans, and bac­te­ri­al counts below the per­mit­ted limits are almost always pre­sent, espe­ci­al­ly in older pipe net­works such as in Lon­gye­ar­by­en.

Howe­ver, due to the rather dribb­ling com­mu­ni­ca­ti­on stra­tegy of the local aut­ho­ri­ty (Lon­gye­ar­by­en Lokals­ty­re), the issue did beco­me, well, an issue. It was a bit like ‘we have legio­nella in our drin­king water, but don’t worry, ever­y­thing is fine’. More pre­cise details on the type and bac­te­ri­al count were not made public; accor­ding to offi­ci­al infor­ma­ti­on, the water was (and is, with one caveat, see below) still drinkable and safe for human health.

At the end of Febru­ary, Lokals­ty­re orga­nis­ed a resi­dents’ mee­ting to pro­vi­de infor­ma­ti­on on the cur­rent situa­ti­on regar­ding drin­king water (legio­nella and man­gane­se, see below), and the­re are now a num­ber of announce­ments and press releases on the Lokals­ty­re web­site as well as artic­les and let­ters to the edi­tor in the Sval­bard­pos­ten.

No health pro­blems due to Legio­nella are said to have occur­red so far. The­se could occur pri­ma­ri­ly by inha­ling germ-con­ta­mi­na­ted very small water dro­p­lets (aero­so­le) in the air, for exam­p­le when showe­ring. A poten­ti­al risk is said to exist abo­ve all for risk groups such as older or immu­n­o­com­pro­mi­sed peo­p­le.

Legio­nella noti­ce at the drin­king water tap in Lon­gye­ar­by­en har­bour.

A source for the germ could not be loca­li­sed; it is likely that lar­ge parts of the old pipe net­work and the bio­films con­tai­ned the­r­ein are the dif­fu­se source. The levels (bac­te­ri­al counts) were tem­po­r­a­ri­ly redu­ced by adding chlo­ri­ne and the pipes were flus­hed seve­ral times in sec­tions, but neither is a defi­ni­ti­ve solu­ti­on, at least not in the sen­se that Legio­nella will dis­ap­pear in the long term. At times, con­su­mers were advi­sed to take pre­cau­tio­na­ry mea­su­res, such as showe­ring wit­hout a show­er head to avo­id ato­mi­sing the water into fine dro­p­lets that could be inha­led. Sval­bard­hal­len (swim­ming and sports hall) was also clo­sed at times. All in all, the­re was quite a lot of fuss about a pro­blem that was actual­ly harm­less accor­ding to offi­ci­al infor­ma­ti­on, which led to a cer­tain amount of con­cern in town.

It will pro­ba­b­ly come down to the fact that chlo­ri­ne will have to be added to the drin­king water again and again in the long term in order to keep the bac­te­ri­al load within accep­ta­ble limits. The side effect is that the drin­king water tas­tes of chlo­ri­ne, just like in a swim­ming pool. It looks like you have to get used to it. The­re are also small, house­hold water fil­ters based on acti­va­ted car­bon that help the water regain its fresh fla­vour. Others have been buy­ing bot­t­led water from the Sval­bard­bu­tik­ken super­mar­ket for some time. The lar­ge (five lit­re) bot­t­les are now ratio­ned the­re: only three bot­t­les are sold per house­hold per day so that the­re is enough for ever­yo­ne.

Water bot­t­les in Sval­bard­bu­tik­ken.

But the­re is ano­ther pro­blem: man­gane­se, a metal (che­mi­cal­ly more pre­cise: tran­si­ti­on metal) that occurs fre­quent­ly in natu­re, inclu­ding in the sedi­men­ta­ry rocks around Lon­gye­ar­by­en. Man­gane­se is also pre­sent in pret­ty much every sip of drin­king water world­wi­de, but as always, the quan­ti­ty is the point.

The Nor­we­gi­an Health Aut­ho­ri­ty (FHI, Fol­ke­hels­e­insti­tutt), which was con­sul­ted, has now con­cluded that the man­gane­se levels in the drin­king water have been too high sin­ce Sep­tem­ber 2024 to sup­p­ly infants (0-12 months) with it. Affec­ted fami­lies can get free bot­t­led water at Sval­bard­bu­tik­ken. For ever­yo­ne else, howe­ver, the­re should be no health risk asso­cia­ted with the con­sump­ti­on of tap water; health-rele­vant expo­sure should only occur at hig­her con­cen­tra­ti­ons over lon­ger peri­ods of time (10 years and more). Acu­te poi­so­ning is only theo­re­ti­cal­ly pos­si­ble at extre­me­ly high con­cen­tra­ti­ons.

This is the offi­ci­al posi­ti­on. For adults (ever­y­bo­dy older than 12 months 😄), the fol­lo­wing the­r­e­fo­re still appli­es: rai­se your glas­ses and che­ers, it just some­ti­mes doesn’t tas­te quite fresh, but it doesn’t mat­ter.

I would like to express­ly point out that I am not an expert on drin­king water and Legio­nella and man­gane­se in it; I am sum­ma­ri­sing offi­ci­al reports to the best of my know­ledge, but not my own assess­ment or opi­ni­on.

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