Campus conducting wastewater testing

Binghamton University’s efforts to identify potential hotspots of COVID-19 infection early extend to wastewater testing of 13 locations on campus.

Also known as sanitary testing, wastewater testing works by identifying COVID-19 viral particles in the waste stream shed by infected individuals via solid bodily waste.

“We’re utilizing wastewater testing as an early surveillance tool,” said JoAnn Navarro, vice president for operations. “This method of testing has successfully been used in the past for early detection of other types of diseases; it’s obviously new for COVID-19.

“If sampling results show a detectable limit of virus in one of the sampling locations, we will be able to focus our surveillance testing in that particular building or community,” Navarro added. ”The earlier we can identify a hotspot, the quicker we can react to it and isolate or quarantine students accordingly.”

Binghamton University Environmental Health and Safety (EHS) staff oversee the process, which began this summer by gathering an initial baseline sample from the two main sewage lines leaving campus. The baseline samples produced “no virus detected” results, though there were hundreds of staff and contractors on campus at the time.

To date, five rounds of tests have been performed. None of the test results have shown any detectable virus, with the exception of the waste stream associated with the on-campus residence halls where students who tested positive during move in were isolated. The quantity of viral particles detected in that waste stream was very low, consistent with the number of known isolated students, confirming the effectiveness and sensitivity of the wastewater testing protocol.

The University determined that monitoring at the residential community level and the buildings with the highest population density (Newing and Dickinson) will provide a strong representation of how well virus transmission mitigation measures are working for the campus as a whole.

Kelly Donovan, assistant director of Environmental Health and Safety (EHS) on campus, is familiar with wastewater testing on campus — he already tests for metals and other particulates on a quarterly basis.

To conduct the COVID-19 testing of wastewater, he said, first you find the manholes that provide access. “You then set up an auto sampler that looks like a plastic R2D2 and it draws a sample as often as you tell it to for a period of time, and it gives you a composite sample.”

The wastewater, also called grey water, might be anywhere from 5 to 30 feet down from the manhole, running rapidly at 6 to 8 inches deep, Donovan said. “We drop a probe and draw the sample, put it on ice and send it to a lab.”

Binghamton has contracted with Microbac Laboratories, a national company based in Cortland, N.Y., to test its samples, which are actually sent to its Oakridge, Tenn., location for analysis. Results are generally available in about three days.

“The theory is that a composite sample gives a better picture. We do three-hour samplings at 13 locations on campus using Microbac’s four available auto samplers, from morning to mid-afternoon Mondays and Tuesdays,” Donovan said.

EHS will continue to directly monitor the waste streams of Mountainview, College-in-the-Woods, Hinman, Hillside and Susquehanna communities, as well as each individual residence hall in the Newing and Dickinson communities.

This level of testing will allow the University to pinpoint hot spots and increase testing of students living in the specific communities or buildings that show any virus activity, Donovan said. “If we get anything detectable, we’ll look closely at the area it is coming from.”