08/11/2026
TODAY'S TU ARTICLE - HIGH COPPER CORROSION
Test results show high copper corrosion rate at Niskayuna water plant, pump station.
Contractor M.J. Engineering recommends using caustic soda in mix, a $133,179 fix
By Tyler A. McNeil,Staff WriterAug 11, 2026
MJ Engineering’s final report recommended adding sodium hydroxide, as testing results showed lower — albeit still higher than industry standard — copper corrosion rates with pH adjustments.
Jim Franco/Times Union
NISKAYUNA — Copper sample strips tested at a town water treatment plant and pump station broke down at a severe rate, a recently released study from MJ Engineering shows.
Each sample of the chemical alloy tested in Niskayuna between late 2025 and early this year exceeded 1.001 mils per year, falling into the highest category of corrosion per Association of Water Technologies standards. The highest rate tested was 6.289 mils per year.
The sample strips, also known as coupons, are used to monitor corrosion rates.
MJ Engineering’s report comes after years of complaints from residents over bluish-green water stains, a sign of elevated copper levels. Its presence has drawn safety concerns because copper, although a micronutrient, has been linked to adverse health conditions — including vomiting, nausea, and, over a prolonged period of time, liver and kidney damage — when consumed in high concentrations.
Town Supervisor Erin Cassady-Dorion has emphasized that the water from the 7 Lock Road plant is safe for consumption and meets governmental standards. But the corrosion, she said, can cause plumbing issues for certain properties.
“Water is corrosive by nature, so we’re never going to be able to get rid of all of it,” Cassady-Dorion said. “But if we can make it a little bit better, then we’re talking about levels that hopefully aren’t going to test again in that range. It will certainly be as low as we can get them without (negatively) impacting the pH in water.”
MJ Engineering’s final report recommended adding sodium hydroxide or caustic soda, as testing results showed lower — albeit still higher than industry standard — corrosion rates with pH adjustments.
The town decommissioned an 8,000-gallon caustic soda tank in 1998 to meet storage regulations. After a few days without injecting it, officials determined that caustic soda didn’t make much of a difference in filtering out manganese and iron, and stopped using it.
Having infrastructure that incorporates caustic soda once again will require the town to pay $133,179, MJ Engineering determined.
According to Assemblyman Phillip G. Steck, a Democrat who represents Niskayuna, the town recently had state funding set aside to pay for the project. Cassady-Dorion, also a Democrat, said that some money had also been previously budgeted for the work.
“We were pretty sure we were going to be going in this direction,” she said.
Town Council Member Ashok Ramasubramanian, chair of the Town Board’s Water, Sewer, Engineering & Environmental Committee, has been working with Steck and Cassady-Dorion on the issue.
The Democratic town lawmaker was grilled about the impact and logistics of dealing with high copper corrosion rates from residents at a committee meeting last week. There, he said that he gave out the report to specific residents, but declined to name who, and dismissed public health claims he deemed outside the scope of the report.
Ramasubramanian didn’t return requests for comment.
The meeting Ramasubramanian chaired included some criticism from Niskayuna Republican Party officials. GOP secretary Linda Rizzo, who spoke at the Aug. 4 meeting, told the Times Union that the issue transcends politics, noting that she paid to install a reverse osmosis filtration system in her kitchen out of fear of chemical exposure.
Brett Steenburgh, a professional engineer whose family lives near the water plant on Rosendale Road and also owns a filtration system for one tap since last year, decided not to attend the committee meeting because he didn’t want a “back-and-forth” to erupt between him and Ramasubramanian.
Over the years, Steenburgh has invested large sums of money to replace corroded copper pipes at his home. In June and July of 2025, tests at his home showed copper levels exceeded federal standards.
And the new report didn’t give him solace.
“Those corrosion rates were far greater than I ever anticipated them coming back,” Steenburgh said. “All of my research on it indicates that this is so severe that it requires immediate action.”
The report is currently under review with the Schenectady County Department of Health and the state Department of Health, both agencies confirmed.
Schenectady County government spokesperson Erin Laiacona told the Times Union that comments regarding the findings will be delivered once the review is complete.
Asked about the findings, state Department of Health spokesperson Erin Clary said in an email that corrosion control studies are intended to find treatment remedies for reducing lead, copper or a combination of both in drinking water — not assess water quality or “draw conclusions” about individual copper exposure.
Niskayuna has previously detected “action level” copper samples above 1.3 parts per million at six sites on the east side of town, according to a sample map. Approximately 88 sites were tested within a year-plus-span, Cassady-Dorion said.
Aug 11, 2026
Tyler A. McNeil
Staff Writer
Tyler A. McNeil is a Saratoga County native who covers Schenectady and the Mohawk Valley. He previously worked as a Rensselaer County reporter for the Times Union and a politics and data reporter with the Daily Gazette. McNeil has documented his travels to more than 500 municipalities across 23 counties in upstate New York. He’s a fan of soup, knitwear and maps. You can reach him at [email protected]. See less
