The drought is mostly gone and so are most – but not all – restrictions on water usage.
As the official drought designation in most of the state improved this month to “abnormally dry,” Concord, which uses Penacook Lake for drinking water with the Contoocook River as a backup, has decided to stop urging people to conserve water as of Friday.
It takes weeks or months for moisture from the snowy winter and wet spring to percolate underground.
“We’re pretty much at normal levels,” said Matt Gage, director of Pembroke Water Works, about the five gravel-packed wells used by its system.
This is not unusual for New England, she said.
“People have looked through studies and tried to find correlations between a certain phase and certain weather pattern, but we tend not to find strong relationships with any one thing,” she said.
Notably, we can’t predict our weather future just from El Nino, the pattern of water temperatures in the southern Pacific Ocean that was associated with last year’s drought.
“I caution people not to make a seasonal outlook based on one pattern,” she said.
The long-running drought caused some debate because state law allows towns and cities to forbid homes from doing outdoor watering but gives them no authority over businesses.
A new law that allows local government to stop businesses from watering lawns was likely to be approved Thursday by the state Senate and sent to the governor’s desk for signing.

Duke University Study: Fracking Isn’t Contaminating Ground Water.
It’s been the crux of their narrative against this sector of the economy that’s rapidly growing throughout the country.
The study was three years in the making, peer reviewed, and was recently published in the European journal Geochimica et Cosmochimica Acta.
They did say that surface water might be impacted due to spills: Fracking has not contaminated groundwater in northwestern West Virginia, but accidental spills of fracking wastewater may pose a threat to surface water in the region, according to a new study led by scientists at Duke University.
“Based on consistent evidence from comprehensive testing, we found no indication of groundwater contamination over the three-year course of our study,” said Avner Vengosh, professor of geochemistry and water quality at Duke’s Nicholas School of the Environment.
”However, we did find that spill water associated with fracked wells and their wastewater has an impact on the quality of streams in areas of intense shale gas development.” “The bottom-line assessment,” he said, “is that groundwater is so far not being impacted, but surface water is more readily contaminated because of the frequency of spills.” […] The Duke team collaborated with researchers from The Ohio State University, Pennsylvania State University, Stanford University and the French Geological Survey to sample water from 112 drinking wells in northwestern West Virginia over a three-year period.
Samples were tested for an extensive list of contaminants, including salts, trace metals and hydrocarbons such as methane, propane and ethane.
Remember when the EPA dumped 3 million gallons of toxic water into Colorado’s river systems in 2015?
The clean up costs were projected to soar into the hundreds of millions, and it was completely avoidable.
The EPA’s clean up crew royally screwed up and released the water into the Animas River, which connects to the San Juan River.

Depleted water resources, unquenched thirst, parched throats.
Repally, a small village under Manavapadu mandal under Alampur Taluk of Jogulamba Gadwal district is under severe drinking water crises, as all drinking water sources in the village have dried up except two hand bores.
With summer temperature going up every passing day, the villagers are now expressing apprehensions about the possible predicament they would encounter even these two hand bores go dry in the days ahead.
“We are having only two hand bores to serve the drinking water supply to the entire village.
We have neither an overhead water tank nor adequate underground water supply pipelines to supply tap water to our households.
We are suffering from drinking water scarcity since many years now.
Though the leaders come and promise many things, they are confined only to elections,” says a woman of the village.
With severe drinking water crises arising in the village, old, young and even the school going children are standing in long queues at the hand bores to get their share of water.
The villagers are urging the government authorities to immediately ease their water woes and construct overhead water tank to supply water to each household through water pipelines.
By Amrut Raju Sponsored

Rising temperature dries up wells, water projects across Odisha.
Kutra block with 16 gram panchayats (GPs) has a population of 80,000 and almost all the villages and hamlets are facing scarcity of drinking water.
Villagers are mostly dependent on tube wells, open wells and natural water streams.
A piped water supply project of Rural Water Supply & Sanitation (RWSS) at Panchara was rendered defunct after trial run in 2014 and a similar project at Biringatoli is also not functioning for the last couple of years.
Eight concrete reservoirs for round the clock water supply at Kutra block headquarters are also defunct for long.
At many dry pockets of the block, the situation is turning grim with tube wells not yielding enough water.
Locals said the administration should consider supplying water from three large pits of open cast dolomite and limestone mines at Katang to nearby areas.
Villagers of Baunspada, Andiapara, Bhogra and Jhirpani of Kiringsara GP, Kadopada, Birtola and Upartola village of Purkhapali GP, Jharangdipa, Jamupada, Baunspada, Malupada and Girjapada villages of Kutra GP, Toppopada, Majhipada of Kandeimunda GP, Khuntmunda village of Gangajal GP and many areas of Kandumunda and Rajabasa GPs are facing water scarcity.
Several piped water projects of RWSS are defunct.
Kutra BDO Jagannath Hanuman said the block has about 1,000 tube wells and the block has adequate funds to take up digging up of tube wells if required.

Study finds no groundwater contamination from fracking, but industry not off the hook.
DURHAM, N.C. — Research from a team at Duke University finds ground water contamination from fracking of gas wells is minimal in West Virginia.
“The fact we’re feeling confident it’s not coming from shale gas is that we conducted measurements at about 20 wells prior to any installation of shale gas wells,” he explained.
However, many still have the problem of methane or saline in their water wells.
“One of our findings is naturally occurring and saline ground water is pretty prevalent in this area,” he said.
Management of fracking waste is identified in the same study as a serious problem and a repeated source of surface water contamination.
“We used this same assembly of chemical forensic tools to confirm those spills are indeed coming from frack water.” Dr. Vengosh said it’s not uncommon for the industry to deny the spills were the source of contamination and often blamed it on the region’s long history of mining or conventional gas development.
Several spills happened at the well pad while others were from waste stored at injection well sites.
“Management of the waste water is the weakest part of shale gas development in the area,” Vengosh said.
Even a small volume of that leaking into the environment could cause a huge impact.”

Casella, DEP formalize agreement for new water line in Charlton.
Telegram & Gazette Staff @BLeeTG The towns of Southbridge and Charlton, along with Southbridge landfill operator Casella Waste Systems and the state Department of Environmental Protection on Wednesday signed an administrative consent order that calls for Casella and the state to each pay up to $5 million for a water line from Southbridge to a Charlton neighborhood with contaminated private wells.
As part of the agreement, Casella, doing business as the Southbridge Recycling & Disposal Park at 65 Barefoot Road, has withdrawn its request that Southbridge compensate Casella approximately $2 million for testing of groundwater and for bottled water the company has been providing to some Charlton residents.
Importantly, the agreement provides public water to residents affected by contamination, and officials in both towns are encouraging the Charlton residents to sign up for what will be free hookups to the system.
“I’ve never seen state government come in and so openly try to help towns,” Mr. San Angelo said.
Mr. San Angelo explained that Southbridge can borrow at a lower cost than the company.
Southbridge and Charlton already have an agreement for Southbridge to supply water to Charlton.
In a modification to the municipal agreement, Charlton will own all of the infrastructure for the water line into the Charlton neighborhood near the landfill.
Municipal water is the only feasible solution to the contamination in the neighborhood, eliminates every contaminant currently found in the private wells, and stops the contamination from spreading from our septic systems.
Further, it does nothing to address other neighborhoods in danger of being contaminated, and whose residents are not receiving municipal water, in Sturbridge in Southbridge, Mr. Jordan said.

Duke fracking study finds no contamination of ground water due to fracking.
CLARKSBURG — Fracking has not contaminated groundwater in Northwestern West Virginia, according to a recently released study by scientists at Duke University.
To conduct the study, Duke scientists worked with researchers from The Ohio State University, Pennsylvania State University and the French Geological Survey.
The researchers collected samples from 112 drinking wells in the northwestern region of the state over the course of three years.
Vengosh said the researchers designed and built their own specialized tools to detect a vast array of contaminants, including salts, trace metals, methane and propane.
“They are kind of a forensic tracer to detect whether or not there is an impact of shale gas and fracking on groundwater quality.” The analysis showed that methane and saline were present in both the pre-drilling and post-drilling wells, but that their chemistry was different than that of chemicals used in fracking fluids and shale gas, Vengosh said.
“We found a high level of natural gas and saline in groundwater, but we found that those were naturally occurring and not related to fracking,” he said.
“That’s something you don’t want to have in your home.” Anyone who is concerned about the quality of their well water should have it professionally tested, Vengosh said.
That was due to how the particular wells were constructed, Vengosh said.
“Apparently they did a much better job in West Virginia.” Anne Blankenship, executive director of the West Virginia Oil and Gas Association, said the results of the study were encouraging to professionals in her field.

Radioactive Contaminants Found in Earth’s ‘Pure’ Groundwater.
Pristine groundwater is vulnerable to modern-day pollution, and once contaminated, it could stay like that for as long as thousands of years.
Groundwater is usually found 820 feet under the Earth’s surface.
Given that they are found in the deepest parts of the Earth, they are also believed to be pure.
As such, it provides drinking and irrigation water for billions of people around the world today.
Results showed that traces of rain and snow mixed with tritium are present, indicating the presence of younger water.
As noted by Tech Times, the tritium contamination, although not at an alarming level, was seen at roughly 50 percent of the groundwater.
The result has perplexed the researchers, citing that it is almost implausible to think that groundwater as old as 12,000 years could be polluted by modern-day contaminants.
The researchers write that although the mechanism is not clear, the study revealed that young groundwater may introduce other contaminants (i.e., fertilizers, pesticides, and industrial runoff from the Earth’s surface) to ancient water through leaks and holes in wells, which people use to draw groundwater.
The findings were presented at a European Geosciences Union meeting in Vienna, Austria.

Chemicals found in Fairchild wells not used for drinking water.
Five groundwater wells on Fairchild Air Force Base that are not used for drinking tested high for dangerous chemicals found in firefighting foam, prompting further tests of drinking water sources in the area.
Those findings were part of a water contamination test that has triggered a nationwide review.
The military is testing water at about 400 bases and found problems at more than three dozen, according to an analysis by the Philadelphia Inquirer and Daily News.
The Army has not begun, according to the news report.
The branches and the Pentagon say they are coordinating, but have varying responses on how many bases must be tested, and limited information about remediation timelines and cost.
The chemicals found at Fairchild during the water tests were from past use of fire suppression foam that contain perfluorinated compounds.
After those test results were reported in March, base officials began contacting nearby residents for permission to test their private wells.
“Once we’ve assured that you’re talking eight years to get yourself to a remediation solution.” Contamination has been found near 27 military bases in 16 states, according to the Air Force, Navy, and Army.
The Air Force, Navy, and Army say they have similar plans: First, they will sample bases where the foam, known as aqueous film-forming foam, may have been used, then assess whether remediation is needed.

Study: Fracking is not contaminating ground water in West Virginia.
Scientists at Duke University have completed a 3-year study which found that fracking in an area of West Virginia has not contaminated groundwater there.
From Fox News: “Based on consistent evidence from comprehensive testing, we found no indication of groundwater contamination over the three-year course of our study,” explained Avner Vengosh, the professor of geochemistry and water quality at Duke’s Nicholas School of the Environment… ”However, we did find that spill water associated with fracked wells and their wastewater has an impact on the quality of streams in areas of intense shale gas development,” Vengosh added.
The researchers took samples from 112 drinking wells in northwestern West Virginia.
This indicated that they occured naturally in the region’s shallow aquifers and were not the result of the recent shale gas operations.
This is not the first such finding we’ve reported here at Hot Air.
Last November, Jazz reported on a similar two-year study in Wyoming which found no evidence of contamination of groundwater by fracking.
In that case, evidence suggested a problem which created a bad smell was likely caused by the EPA itself.
A six-year EPA study released last December concluded that there was evidence fracking had contributed to surface water contamination (as did the West Virginia study) but was silent on the issue of contamination of ground water.
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