The Partnership was developed through cooperation among the U.S. EPA, states, and water supply associations to provide better protection for consumers from microbial contaminants that can cause intestinal illness. Since joining the Partnership, Waterworks has implemented a number of improvements that allows us to provide even better quality water to all our customers. The primary source of your drinking water is the Chickahominy River. Water is not pumped from the Chickahominy during low flow periods. When available, water is pumped from the river above Walker's Dam and transferred to reservoirs for storage.
Waterworks owns and operates five reservoirs that store and supply water to the treatment plants.
It stores rainwater, steamflows, and runoff from the watershed area. A secondary source of your drinking water is brackish groundwater pumped from deep wells in the Lee Hall area. Newport News Waterworks and other Hampton Roads water utilities are participating in a study of our reservoirs and watershed area that will identify potential sources of contamination to our reservoirs. When the assessment is complete, we will make those results available to you. As water travels over the surface of the land or through the ground, it dissolves naturally-occurring minerals and radioactive material, and can pick up substances resulting from the presence of animals or from human activity.