getwetprojectblog

Groundwater pollution may be an overlooked aspect of Arizona water issues

PHOENIX — You can’t see it, but how we live impacts it and plays a vital role in almost everything that happens in Arizona. Groundwater is located deep beneath the surface and stored in aquifers, which are porous rock that contain or transport water.

About 40% of the state’s water supply is underground, with that number likely to increase due to reductions in available water from the Colorado River. Sarah Porter, director of the Kyl Center for Water Policy at Arizona State University, said the reliance on the resource stems from Arizona’s geography.

“A lot of Arizona does not have a convenient surface water supply, but we did have water in the ground,” Porter said.

An ongoing concern is what would happen if the valuable resource got contaminated. Thankfully, according to Porter, much of Arizona is regulated to catch dangerous chemicals and pollutants before reaching the water we drink.

Dr. Rebecca Muenich, associate professor of environmental engineering at ASU, points out a different dilemma. Those same standards don’t apply to private wells. “This is, in turn, a problem because about a third of those wells exceed human health based standards for one or more pollutants,” Muenich said.

How microplastics affect human health

Water bottles. Shopping bags. Computers. Medical equipment. Food containers. And on and on and on.

Plastics. They never go away. And even if we can’t see them — they’re everywhere.

“They are carried in the atmosphere, they are raining down on us. They’ve been found in the Himalayan mountains,” Erica Cirino says. “So right now we are immersed in a microplastics and nanoplastics soup.”

But are those microplastics inside of us?

“About five years ago was when scientists first began questioning, Are there plastics inside our bodies? And indeed there are,” Cirino adds.

For the first time, microplastics have been found in living humans — their lungs and blood.

Do water bottles expire?

Do water bottles expire? We explore whether water bottles have an expiration date and if you should swap from disposable to reusable.

It’s a question you’ve probably never thought about: do water bottles expire? While the best water bottles that are reusable certainly don’t, before you go stockpiling bottled water, the expiration date is something that you may just want to be aware of.

Bottled water does indeed come with an expiration date – even though the water itself doesn’t go bad. The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA), which regulates bottled drinking water, doesn’t legally require a shelf life on bottled water. But because plastic can begin leaching into bottled water over time, they generally have an expiration date of 2 years from the date of manufacture.

Figuring out how to stay hydrated is vital to your health, with water doing everything from preventing dehydration to carrying nutrients and oxygen to your entire body. So, what should you be using to hydrate – bottled water or a reusable water bottle? Single-use water bottles are popular because they’re an easy and fast solution to drink water. Reusable water bottles are a safer option to drink from and will save you money in the long run. Let’s take a closer look.

UMaine scientist: PFAS affects species of plants, animals differently

Apr. 24—POLAND — A scientist from the University of Maine tackled one of the more well publicized — but far less understood — issues facing many Mainers: forever chemicals.

Excelsior Grange hosted the PFAS discussion Friday, with more than a dozen in attendance.

Per- and polyfluorinated substances, commonly referred to as PFAS or “forever chemicals,” are a group of more than 4,000 man-made chemicals commonly found in nonstick and water-resistant surfaces on cookware, clothing, furniture, food packaging and more. “You name it,” said Richard Kersbergen, professor of sustainable dairy and forage systems at UMaine. “If it doesn’t stick, it’s probably got some PFAS in it, or had PFAS in it.”

Although its impact on human health is not yet fully understood, studies indicate PFAS can increase cholesterol levels, decrease the body’s vaccine response, prompt changes in liver enzymes, and elevate an individual’s risk of kidney or testicular cancer.

“They’re forever chemicals because they don’t break down,” he said. “They have a carbon-fluoride bond that’s incredibly strong. There’s lots of research going on as to how to actually destroy PFAS, and that’s the problem. We don’t have good ways to destroy it.”

Kersbergen has been working with the Maine Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to better understand the “root pathway from soil to (feed) to cow, to milk, to child.”

Once the chemical is ingested, it can take a human anywhere from five to 60 years for half of the PFAS in their body to leave, depending on the amount present, Kersbergen said.

Research shows that PFOS, a subgroup of PFAS, has “declined dramatically” in human blood since 2000, when it was first tested for.

New Buoys & Platforms Along Fairfield Coast Being Used for Water Quality Research

FAIRFIELD, CT — The Fairfield Harbor Management Commission has announced it will collaborate with the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) in a three-year water quality data collection and research effort in Southport Harbor and Sasco Creek.

The investigation, in cooperation with the Connecticut Department of Energy and Environmental Protection (DEEP), is aimed at expanding scientific knowledge of water quality issues along the Fairfield shoreline and in several other coastal Connecticut communities including Mystic, Norwalk and Westport.

The research effort will start in May as USGS scientists begin installing equipment to collect water quality data at select locations. This includes a marked buoy platform with scientific instruments at the mouth of Southport Harbor and instruments at the Pequot Yacht Club within the harbor. Data will be collected throughout the year, and scientists will also periodically collect manual water samples at those two locations as well as the mouth of Sasco Creek under the Pequot Avenue bridge.

“USGS scientists will collect water quality samples from three locations along the Fairfield shoreline, providing water resource managers with a detailed understanding as to how, and to what extent, excessive amounts of nutrients affect the coastal bays of Long Island Sound,” said USGS Hydrologic Technician Brittney Izbicki.

‘Forever chemicals’ linger in West Virginia streams, blood samples

It’s been nearly six years since city officials in Martinsburg, WV, learned that one of the wells supplying drinking water to their community contained harmful levels of per– and polyfluoroalkyl substances, extremely persistent compounds often called “forever chemicals.”

Authorities promptly took the tainted well out of service and only resumed using it in December 2017 after installing a granular activated-carbon treatment system to deal with the contaminants. Since the treatment system went online, PFAS concentrations in Martinsburg’s water have been below the health threshold recommended by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.

But the compounds have continued to show up in the area’s groundwater and local streams, and questions remain about health effects from area residents’ lengthy exposures to the toxic chemicals.

A recent report by the U.S. Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry found that residents of Martinsburg and surrounding Berkeley County who drank public tapwater still had elevated levels of two PFAS compounds in their bodies roughly 3.5 years after the contaminated well had been taken offline.

Water contamination source found at William Beaumont Army Medical Center, officials report

The cause of the contaminated water at the new William Beaumont Army Medical Center in East El Paso appears to have been found and the water system is being fixed, officials announced Tuesday afternoon.

A valve failure in the hospital’s water softener system appears to have put brine, or salty water, into the water system, causing “limited piping corrosion,” which resulted in sediment contaminating and discoloring the water, officials said in a news release.

Meanwhile, the hospital on Monday reopened its emergency department to trauma patients and again allowed elective surgeries by using bottled water and having surgical instruments sanitized at another El Paso hospital, Beaumont officials reported.

Elective surgeries had been canceled and trauma patients diverted to other hospitals since April 7, after it was determined the water system had been contaminated with sediment.

Popular Florida sea turtle center losing entire medical staff as water quality issues continue: report

Problems continue to plague the popular Loggerhead Marinelife Center in South Florida with reports its entire medical staff will be gone by May.

After water quality issues remain a concern for the rehabilitation center and attraction in Juno Beach, the center once again has no sea turtles on site, according to a report from WPTV.

The center has been a working hospital that takes in all species of sea turtles for more than 30 years.

WPTV reports that all of the veterinary hospital section of the center have either left or given notice. Last week there were only four sea turtles utilizing its 26 rehab pools, but now there are none.

Delray Beach water inspector says city fired her for disclosing contamination

DELRAY BEACH, Fla. — A former Delray Beach employee has filed a whistleblower lawsuit against the city, claiming she was harassed and terminated for disclosing alleged contamination of the city’s drinking water.

According to the lawsuit, the city terminated wastewater inspector Christine Ferrigan in January, claiming “reorganization” although her position had been approved and funded.

The lawsuit contends the city terminated Ferrigan following a series of public health-related disclosures she made to her management and other state and city officials about alleged contamination of Delray Beach’s drinking water.

The suit also claims city officials terminated her in part to prevent her from disclosing information about the utility department’s handling of cross connection and drinking water contamination issues to oversight agencies.

Popular Florida sea turtle center losing entire medical staff as water quality issues continue: report

Problems continue to plague the popular Loggerhead Marinelife Center in South Florida with reports its entire medical staff will be gone by May.

After water quality issues remain a concern for the rehabilitation center and attraction in Juno Beach, the center once again has no sea turtles on site, according to a report from WPTV.

The center has been a working hospital that takes in all species of sea turtles for more than 30 years.

“At this time we do not have any sea turtle patients in our hospital,” a notice on the center’s website reads. “We’re incredibly proud that our Hospital team cared for 83 sea turtles (plus 704 hatchlings!) in 2021. We’re eagerly standing by to rescue and respond to the next sea turtles requiring care, and putting the final touches on our stunning new outdoor sea turtle hospital, which will open soon.”

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this: