What about floating pontoons with solar cells? The covered surface would then be used also to make electricity, and offset the cost of the measure.
…or just react the bromates away during processing?
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I don’t want to sound too Pollyannaish, but on the rare occasions a municipal utility does something that makes your inner geek say “ooh, innnnnnnnnnnteresting,” they’ve probably thought it through about as well as is humanly possible. Civil engineers rarely get the chance to be creative in a proactive way, and I doubt they’d miss the chance to do it right.
I’m directing that at basically all the snark here (and snark was my first impulse, too), but to take your example: turning a lake into a giant mirror might have undesirable effects on the microclimate, or on wildlife; coating the balls with another ingredient of different chemical makeup than the one they wanted might defeat the anti-carcinogenic purpose, or introduce other toxic effects, or raise the price past the point of feasibility; non-spherical objects might be more likely to foul drainage or get tangled up in one another; evaporation might be a trivial concern compared to poor supply or excessive demand.
In short, whatever godawful catastrophe inevitably arises from this, I doubt it will be of the “shoulda thought of that” variety. 
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Steel shutters like at missile silos!
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The Homeland Security Agency provided me with a small SBIR grant for alternatives to chlorine in purification of water. My solution as well as those provided by other small businesses was rejected in favor of one proposed by a well connected University.
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People say that New York, Chicago, Detroit are tough cities. But LA, now THAT city has some balls!
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If you’re watching, Portland, remember - no peeing in the ball pit!
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Simple, they just ran time backwards. Didn’t you see the .gif?
Will they interfere with my dog-given right to pee into the reservoir?
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That’s fairly common. What were the differences and the stated reasons?
Bromides in water are quite a bitch. Add chlorine, they turn to bromine and react with stuff to organobromides, namely bromoform. Add ozone, they turn to bromates. Is there a way to get rid of them in an economic way? Maybe anion-exchange resins, exchange for Cl- or OH-?
The Internet has ruined me to the point where I can’t hear “bromate” without thinking of it as some sort of dudebro slang for inseparable yet strictly platonic guy friends.
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Ping pong balls are made of celluloid, perhaps the last application for this ancient polymer.
I would expect celluloid balls to degrade rather quickly out in the sun.
I know, the clock reaction! All in pretty colors, too1!!1!
[edit] – being silly, of course. We are probably talking about a few PPM of bromide/bromate, and not enough to produce any visible color. Nor are they going to add cerium salts to the reservoir.
But the polyethylene balls should be good little sponges for soaking up small amounts of bromine. From the first day’s lecture in organic, Br2 + H-C… yields HBr + Br-C… and if your hydrocarbon is big enough, instead of bromoform you get brominated polyethylene, and it stays in the ball.
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Celluloid is highly flammable. I wonder if a floating sheet of them would allow flame propagation.
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I wasn’t suggesting ping pong balls were a good choice - just noting that they are used by some home cooks in sous vide cooking, which is obviously a very different application, but somewhat analogous. Also, apparently, not all that effective even for that purpose.
Veering wildly off course here, but for sous vide Reflectix is your friend.
I still use aluminum as well as Reflectix as a ‘lid’, but its R value for the money is great.
To keep bags submerged I usually throw a stainless fork or spoon in the bag.
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Laboratory water-baths say on them that you’re supposed to use plastic balls to reduce evaporation above a certan temperature (60 deg. C IIRC).
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Yes I saw that, though I think in those applications solid balls are recommended.
Pool covers are pretty mature technology.
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Money. You’re already spending a lot for ozone treatment, so it’s hard to justify the added expenditure. Of course, you can solve the problem by using chlorine in the first place, but that carries its own risks.
Or you could drink untreated water and see how that works out for you.
Bah. A little unstoppable diarrhea for a week is good for the soul.
