La Crosse County, WI (WXOW) – La Crosse County Health Department issued a health advisory on Thursday after dangerous levels of nitrates and bacteria were found in private wells in the Town of Onalaska and the Town of Holland.
La Crosse County Health officials said they found clusters of private wells with contaminated water during annual water testing.
They say the water contamination is the result of bacteria and nitrate build up for over a decade.
Health officials said traces of nitrate are evident in normal drinking water, but some of the groundwater tested in the private wells had dangerously high nitrate levels.
High nitrate levels could cause birth defects and the rare, "Blue Baby Syndrome."
"Municipal water sources are safe," Rombalski said.
"They routinely test and very often monitor their well water quality, and there is no concern at this time about municipal water supplies."
She urges residents in those areas to use bottled water for drinking and cooking, or boil it to kill bacteria.
There is no easy solution to removing these contaminants.
It may be a long-term problem.

La Crosse County warns of nitrates in town of Onalaska, Holland well water.
Private well owners in the western half of the towns of Onalaska and Holland are being urged to test their water after the La Crosse County Health Department discovered worrisome levels of nitrates and bacteria in much of the water supply.
Water contamination data was requested in response to a 2016 audit showing multiple failings by the Wisconsin DNR to enforce the clean water laws.
Water typically registers 1 mcg per ml, and anything more than 10 mcg per ml can cause health problems, especially for infants and pregnant women.
Risks include birth defects and “blue baby syndrome.” Private well water also tested positive for coliform, which in itself may not cause illness but can indicate the presence of E. coli, which may cause gastrointestinal problems including diarrhea and vomiting.
Health and Human Services Committee Chair Monica Kruse stated that an exact cause of the contamination has not been determined, but contributing factors include sandy soil, run-off and general land use.
“It can take years and decades for this to occur and show up, and it can take years and decades for the levels to go back down,” Rombalski stressed.
Kits are available at the La Crosse County Health Department, with results available by mail in two to four business days.
Those with elevated nitrate levels are advised to use bottled water for drinking and cooking and to consider having reverse osmosis systems installed or have a deeper or new well drilled.
Bacteria can be killed by boiling water before consumption, but is not recommended when nitrates are also present, as boiling can concentrate nitrates.

In the inaugural issue of the Journal of Open Hardware I review emerging business models for open source hardware.
One way a company can start the transition to the open source way is to open source a single product to drive sales of its other products.
A firm can open source the hardware they sell in order to expand the market of other parts of their product line.
The nitrate reductase from plants—NECi’s first enzyme product—reduces nitrate to nitrite, a first step in the chain that turns the elements into proteins and DNA.
NECi was founded to commercialize nitrate reductase, the focus of Dr. W.H.
They released the first recombinant nitrate reductase to the market as a reliable and cost-effective reagent for nitrate detection.
Open source nitrate testing photometer Perhaps more so here in Michigan than in other parts of the world, we are sensitive to the fact that environmental regulators can sometimes be an inadequate defense of human health from water pollution.
Then they collaborated with my lab by open sourcing a new photometer, which radically undercut the cost of other methods to detect nitrates using their nitrate reductase enzymes.
It is unlikely that NECi, a small enzyme company, will have the least expensive nitrate testing photometer on the market after a few years of international cloning.
In NECi’s case, it directly benefits from increased enzyme sales created by cloners—so cloners, clone away.

WaterWorld Weekly Newscast, January 30, 2017.
The following is a transcript of the WaterWorld Weekly Newscast for January 30, 2017.
Hi, I’m Angela Godwin for WaterWorld magazine, bringing you water and wastewater news headlines for the week of January 30.
Coming up… San Diego announces end to drought emergency Court rules Des Moines water utility not entitled to damages Cali.
water provider cuts ribbon on advanced nitrate removal system Tanzania gets $225M for water supply, sanitation Last week, the San Diego County Water Authority’s Board of Directors declared an end to drought conditions in the region and asked California Governor Jerry Brown to rescind the statewide drought emergency regulations for regions with sufficient supplies.
Owing to wet winter conditions and recent heavy rainfall, as of January 23, San Diego’s official rainfall measurement station recorded 172 percent of average rainfall since the start of the water year on Oct. 1.
Des Moines Water Works was suing drainage districts in three Iowa counties over elevated nitrate levels.
When nitrate levels spike, Des Moines must use a costly nitrate removal system to meet drinking water regulations.
Rather, that should happen through the state legislature via policy changes.
For Pasadena’s Sunny Slope Water Company, which relies 100% on groundwater, cost-effectively reducing high nitrate levels has been a major objective.

WaterWorld Weekly Newscast, January 30, 2017.
The following is a transcript of the WaterWorld Weekly Newscast for January 30, 2017.
Hi, I’m Angela Godwin for WaterWorld magazine, bringing you water and wastewater news headlines for the week of January 30.
Coming up… San Diego announces end to drought emergency Court rules Des Moines water utility not entitled to damages Cali.
water provider cuts ribbon on advanced nitrate removal system Tanzania gets $225M for water supply, sanitation Last week, the San Diego County Water Authority’s Board of Directors declared an end to drought conditions in the region and asked California Governor Jerry Brown to rescind the statewide drought emergency regulations for regions with sufficient supplies.
Owing to wet winter conditions and recent heavy rainfall, as of January 23, San Diego’s official rainfall measurement station recorded 172 percent of average rainfall since the start of the water year on Oct. 1.
Des Moines Water Works was suing drainage districts in three Iowa counties over elevated nitrate levels.
When nitrate levels spike, Des Moines must use a costly nitrate removal system to meet drinking water regulations.
Rather, that should happen through the state legislature via policy changes.
For Pasadena’s Sunny Slope Water Company, which relies 100% on groundwater, cost-effectively reducing high nitrate levels has been a major objective.

Because the state data doesn’t account for the nearly 2 million Californians still relying on private wells or factor in contamination from Chromium-6, experts said the number of people with toxic water is likely even higher.
“When I shower my kids, I use to give them hot baths, but not anymore,” Gonzalez said.
“Now we just wash, rinse and get out.” The water that comes out of her Oakvale Park home is contaminated.
The contaminated water runs into about 100 homes in the area.
“It can cause cancer (and) in the case of nitrate in very high levels, it can even cause death after a few days of high exposure.” Her organization said short-term health effects of drinking uranium-contaminated water include nausea, vomiting, and diarrhea, as well as liver and kidney damage.
Water is shut-off to some 18,000 students at four different school districts as further testing is done.
“Having toxic water coming out of your tap, not being able to access water in schools, this is really basic.” Tainted water in wells and public water systems in the San Diego area contain unsafe levels of uranium, fluoride, nitrate and arsenic, according to the state data.
“Here we are in the 21st century in the great state of California, one of the largest economies in the world, and people do not have water running in their homes.” While the state has made progress in getting clean, safe drinking water to rural residents, Felicia Marcus, chair of California’s Water Resources Control Board, says there’s more to do.
Although more than a million residents are estimated to be affected by contaminated water, it’s not something on the minds of those living in California’s urban centers.
In Oakvale Park, Juana Gonzalez helps some of her less fortunate neighbors by giving them a ride to the nearest place to buy water.