National Water Quality Laboratory Round-Robin Participation To: "E - All WRD Employees" Subject: National Water Quality Laboratory Round-Robin Participation Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Date: Fri, 15 Mar 1996 16:39:08 -0700 From: "Peter F Rogerson, Chief, BAS, NWQL, Denver, CO" The National Water Quality Laboratory (NWQL) apologizes to all our District customers for failing to participate in the latest U.S. Geological Survey's Evaluation Program for Standard Reference Water Samples (SRWS). Through a series of unusual occurrences, the samples did not receive the usual battery of analytical tests. The NWQL participates in approximately 20 different interlaboratory performance evaluation studies each year, including the SRWS program, and it is my firm intent that the NWQL continue participating in all of these exercises. In this instance, the round-robin SRWS samples for this exercise were delivered by hand to the NWQL in October and placed in a refrigerator. We did not recognize that these were the round-robin samples from the SRWS Program. In January, personnel from the Branch of Technical Development and Quality Systems (BTD&QS) contacted the Quality Assurance Unit (QAU) to inquire what happened to the data. At that time the NWQL found the samples in an unmarked box in a refrigerator, but it was too late to submit data for the round-robin study. The NWQL deeply regrets missing this opportunity to participate in the latest round-robin SRWS program and reaffirms its commitment to provide the best quality data to District customers. The NWQL has changed the procedures by which these samples arrive at the NWQL to ensure careful handling and analysis. The NWQL will also conduct analysis of these SRWS samples in order to provide complete data to the BTD&QS. For those customers interested in data-quality issues at the NWQL, we participate fully in another program conducted by the BTD&QS, the Blind Sample Program (BSP). The BSP is submitting approximately $130,000 of analytical requests to the NWQL for Fiscal Year 1996 as blind samples using SRWS. The results of these analyses are available to you through a computer program called QADATA on QVARSA. Please contact Amy Ludtke in the BTD&QS for more information.