The Herts County Council in Great Britain is having a problem with “bromate” and “bromide” ions in the groundwater there. They could pollute the local drinking water resource.
As it turns out, this is nothing new there. In fact, the situation was first recognized two or more decades ago and remedial actions have been ongoing for about ten years now and are still continuing to this date. The bromate/bromide source was a chemical factory, in operation between 1955 and 1980 that manufactured or used “bromate” and “bromide” in their works.