District’s Environmental Health Director Addresses Oscoda Water Contamination Concerns.
We got some answers on the Oscoda water contamination issue from District Health Department #2’s Environmental Health Director.
On April 25th, a town hall meeting was held in Oscoda to continue the conversation, and catch up those of us who didn’t have all the details.
The contaminants, called perfluorinated chemicals, or PFA’s, were accidentally leaked into groundwater by the former Wurtsmith Air Force Base.
Environmental Health Director Chuck Lichon says while they are still trying to understand the issue completely, they are working closely with residents to make sure they have access to safe drinking water.
Or they can get a water cooler.
This is not just a local issue, however.
The air force is currently working with PFA leakages in cities across the nation.
And 38 of the 40 also have issues with these Perfluorinated chemicals or PFA’s, into the groundwater,” Lichon says.
We’ll unveil the history that led to the leaks in the first place, learn about the different organizations involved and what they’re doing to combat the problem locally, and hear how the Air Force is responding to the national threat.

District’s Environmental Health Director Addresses Oscoda Water Contamination Concerns.
We got some answers on the Oscoda water contamination issue from District Health Department #2’s Environmental Health Director.
On April 25th, a town hall meeting was held in Oscoda to continue the conversation, and catch up those of us who didn’t have all the details.
The contaminants, called perfluorinated chemicals, or PFA’s, were accidentally leaked into groundwater by the former Wurtsmith Air Force Base.
Environmental Health Director Chuck Lichon says while they are still trying to understand the issue completely, they are working closely with residents to make sure they have access to safe drinking water.
Or they can get a water cooler.
This is not just a local issue, however.
The air force is currently working with PFA leakages in cities across the nation.
And 38 of the 40 also have issues with these Perfluorinated chemicals or PFA’s, into the groundwater,” Lichon says.
We’ll unveil the history that led to the leaks in the first place, learn about the different organizations involved and what they’re doing to combat the problem locally, and hear how the Air Force is responding to the national threat.

WASHINGTON, May 3, 2017—Center for Food Safety (CFS) today released Water Hazards 2.0: Continued Aquatic Contamination by Neonicotinoid Insecticides in the United States, an update to the 2015 report, “Water Hazard: Aquatic Contamination by Neonicotinoid Insecticides in the United States,” which shows continued widespread water contamination from neonicotinoid insecticides.
In particular, the report draws attention to new research that shows a presence of these pesticides in water bodies across the country at levels known to be toxic to several aquatic invertebrates.
Neonicotiniod seed coatings, the largest use of these chemicals, are still not regulated by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).
As this report update makes clear, the scientific evidence continues to mount, yet so far, the EPA has taken no mitigation measures to deal with this growing crisis in our environment,” said Larissa Walker, pollinator program director at Center for Food Safety.
This is concerning as representative studies highlighted in this year’s follow-up report show that continued exposure to neonicotinoid chemicals may cause irreparable neural damage to species impacted, leading to rippling negative effects throughout the food web.
In light of new science and EPA’s inaction in the face of continued contamination, the report makes numerous additional policy recommendations to EPA to stem this ongoing crisis, especially in relation to shortcomings in the agency’s Preliminary Aquatic Risk Assessment to Support the Registration Review of Imidacloprid: EPA in the final risk assessment should more accurately portray the risk posed by seed-coatings.
Background: Neonicotinoid products are applied on more than 150 million acres of crop land annually, with seed coatings being the most common form of application.
Peer-reviewed studies from Holland already show that neonicotinoid contamination correlates significantly with bird population declines and numerous other species are thought be at risk.
There is also new science suggesting that sub-lethal exposure in agricultural landscapes is damaging to wild bees and could have long term repercussions on populations.
Other recent studies – including by EPA itself – have reinforced CFS’s report.

Bottled water is a scam for most Americans — but a new report reveals some surprising places where it’s dangerous to drink the tap.
People living near private wells do not enjoy the same rigorous testing as those whose water comes from public sources.
Typically, tap water is tested regularly for quality and contamination in accordance with laws from the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).
In its new report, the NRDC documents more than 80,000 violations of the law by community water systems in 2015 alone.
"These violations included exceeding health-based standards, failing to properly test water for contaminants, and failing to report contamination to state authorities or the public."
But in 2015, this law was violated nearly 8,000 times by community water systems serving more than 14 million people, according to the report.
Formal enforcement action, or reporting the problem to the level where the EPA required the community water system to respond to a complaint, was taken in just 10% of cases.
Here’s a map from the report showing the number of people served by community water systems with at least one reported violation of the Safe Drinking Water Act in 2015.
Populations are shaded at the county level to show the number of residents served by systems with violations that occurred that year.
Research suggests that the water from many of these wells is not safe to drink.

SPOKANE, Wash. — Toxic mine pollution is no longer flowing into Washington state’s picturesque Lake Chelan for the first time in nearly 60 years because of a $500 million cleanup to contain contamination from the a mine, officials said this week.
The payoff of the mine cleanup means that clean water now flows into a creek that feeds the lake, a prime recreation destination, said Kari Grover Wier, district ranger for the Wenatchee National Forest, where the lake is located.
The Holden Mine operated from 1938 to 1957, extracting copper, zinc, gold and silver.
It was abandoned in 1957, but continued to contaminate the environment with toxic metals including aluminum, cadmium, copper, iron and zinc.
The metals also created a hazardous, hard orange coating on the creek’s streambed.
Unstable waste rock and tailings piles from about 10 million tons of mined ore further compounded the problem, the U.S. Forest Service said.
No taxpayer funds were used, the Forest Service said.
As part of the project, a 30-to-90 foot (9-to-27 meters) concrete barrier wall was erected between toxic mine tailings piles and Railroad Creek to prevent runoff.
Thousands of gallons of contaminated ground water are also treated daily at a plant on the site.
The cleanup spending sent about $240 million into the local economies because much of the work was performed by people and businesses in the area, the Forest Service said.

REPORT: Nearly One in Four Americans’ Drinking Water Comes from Untested or Contaminated Systems.
“America is facing a nationwide drinking water crisis that goes well beyond lead contamination,” said Erik Olson, Health Program Director at NRDC and a report co-author.
We take it for granted that when we turn on our kitchen tap, the water will be safe and healthy, but we have a long way to go before that is reality across our country.” “Threats on Tap: Widespread Violations Highlight Need for Investment in Water Infrastructure and Protections” found nearly 80,000 violations impacting drinking water systems in every state, but under-reporting and lax enforcement could mean the number of violations is much higher.
Trump’s Cuts to EPA’s Budget Would Make it Worse for Rural America President Trump’s proposed budget for the EPA would make our failing drinking water system worse.
NRDC’s report shows that even at its current level of funding, the EPA and states are doing an inadequate job of monitoring, testing, and enforcing safe drinking water laws.
The Trump budget also proposes to eliminate all $498 million dollars in funding for rural drinking water and wastewater systems from the Department of Agriculture.
Small systems have the highest percentage of water violations, and it’s largely due to financial and technical capacity issues that will only get worse when the EPA cuts drinking water programs,” said Mae Wu, Senior Attorney with NRDC’s Health program.
Beyond regulated contaminants, which are the focus of this report, many more unregulated contaminants are also found in drinking water.
The EPA has not set a single standard for a new drinking water contaminant since the law was amended in 1996 to change the way new contaminants are regulated.
Safeguarding our Tap Water Investing and improving infrastructure and enforcing the drinking water laws are solutions that will make a difference.

Essay on water pollution in bangladesh rivers.
Essay on water pollution in bangladesh rivers 20 water pollution facts for the United States and throughout the world give us a glimpse into the devastating effects of pollution to inspire action for prevention.
Simple changes like While many parts of the world face major challenges due to limited freshwater availability, a significant amount of the limited freshwater resources in the world are Oceans are polluted by oil on a daily basis from oil spills, routine shipping, run-offs and dumping.
2) Polluted water can lead to Although inhabited and remote, South Sentinel island is covered with plastic!
Water pollution means the contamination of water bodies (e.g. lakes, rivers, oceans and groundwater).
Water pollution mostly occurs when pollutants are dumped pollution.
Pollution is the introduction of contaminants into the natural environment that cause adverse change.
IGCSE Rivers and GCSE Rivers Specification: 2.2.2 River processes Candidates should be able to: • Demonstrate an understanding of the work of a river in eroding The Ganges flows only 200 km through the Himalayas.
The environmental pollution affect the health of more than 120 million people worldwide.
Referring to the expectation of the time that the U.S. population might exceed 300 million by

Unley residents unperturbed about water contamination scare.
KIM Smith and his wife Jo have loved living at their Unley townhouse since they purchased the property on Mary Street about 10 years ago.
His home was one of 300 properties — including those on Charles Lane, Little Charles Lane and Tyne Place — which received a letter from the Environment Protection Authority on Monday evening about a potential trichloroethylene (TCE) contamination.
The harmful chemical was also behind a precautionary evacuation of homes at Clovelly Park and demolition of 25 buildings in 2015.
“There’s nothing we can do anyway,” Mr Smith said.
“It’s a matter of wait and see — what comes to light and then react accordingly whatever that may be.
Mary St resident Andrew Wood, 28, was calm about the potential risks.
Mr Wood, an engineer, has lived in his parent’s property on Mary St for the past 10 years.
“I imagine there is quite a bit of this (testing) done in Adelaide.” Mother-of-one Hongmei Xie, 37, has been living on Mary St for three years with her daughter, Aneesa, 13.
“I don’t know if that has anything to do with the contamination,” she said.

Here’s an overview of some of the key concerns: Groundwater contamination: One big concern is whether the chemicals used in fracking or the natural gas itself could contaminate people’s drinking water.
In recent years, fracking wells have blown out in states like North Dakota.
In another incident, thousands of gallons of fracking fluid leaked out of a storage tank in Dimock, Pennsylvania.
The Environmental Protection Agency is currently conducting a big study into this type of contamination and how to prevent it.
A second question is whether chemicals or natural gas could somehow migrate from the fracked shale layer thousands of feet up into the groundwater — even if the wells are perfectly constructed.
Environmental Protection Agency Wastewater pollution: A separate issue is what happens with all that water after it has been used to crack open shale and is pumped back up to the surface.
But when there aren’t enough injection wells available, the water is either stored in tanks and holding ponds or sent off to treatment plants.
That raises the risk of either accidental spills or improper treatment.
Air pollution: Once an area of shale has been fracked, natural gas begins flowing up out of the well.
In 2012, the EPA began requiring oil and gas companies to limit these emissions and capture the escaped gas.

Govt.
funding deal requires Pentagon to report water contamination at bases.
Under the resolution, the Pentagon must give Congress a list of affected sites within 120 days and include its plans for telling communities about the contamination and when it was detected.
A review by the Inquirer and Daily News found last month that 395 military bases need to be tested for the chemicals, according to numbers from the Air Force, Army and Navy — about 90 more than originally listed by the Defense Department in March 2016.
The rest of Pennsylvania’s congressional delegation has also been pushing for action.
"I am pleased that the spending deal includes the language I secured to require greater transparency from Department of Defense on the issue of water contamination in Bucks and Montgomery Counties," Casey said.
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