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1. Bitter Harvest (Carbon Tetrachloride and Well Water)
2. Contaminated Tap Water
3. Controversy Swirls around Toilet-to-Tap Project
4. Dirty tap water risk for pregnant women
5. Dog waste poses threat to water
6. Drugged Drinking Water
7. Drinking Water Industry Standards
8. FBI says al-Qaida after water supply
9. Five Hidden Dangers of Your Morning Shower
10. Hunt for Endocrine Disrupters Is On
11. Outbreaks of The Toxic Pfiesteria Piscicida Micororanism
12. Roanoke considers ultraviolet treatment system at Crystal Spring
13. Water-Quality Data for Pharmaceuticals, Hormones, and Other Organic Wastewater Contaminants in U.S. Streams, 1999-2000
14. 2000 Kansas Water Assessment 

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Bitter Harvest  (Carbon Tetrachloride and Well Water)

Carbon tetrachloride was used to protect grain from rodents; 

Now it taints well water in the Midwest, and perhaps in Colorado 

Denver Post Staff Writer

Sunday, April 14, 2002 - 

FRANKFORT, Kan. - Sixteen years ago, the U.S. government polluted the town's main drinking water supply with a toxic industrial solvent. The town shut down the well and warned away visitors with a bright red-and-white sign: Not For Human Or Animal Consumption. 

Today the sign has faded pink. The well remains polluted.

And the federal government still won't do anything about its mess.

Intended in the 1950s and 1960s to keep grain safe from rats, a U.S. Department of Agriculture program that doused food stockpiles with a chemical, carbon tetrachloride, has become a blight on the Great Plains.

Frankfort is one of 115 towns that the USDA has admitted contaminating - so far. No one at the USDA knows where the pollution stops.

Though USDA officials say that as many as 4,400 rural facilities were part of the program, the agency has yet to test most. In fact, the agency can't even say how many have been tested for carbon tetrachloride, which the Centers for Disease Control classifies as a probable carcinogen. The USDA says it's doing all it can with a limited budget.

In Colorado alone, the pollution-plagued program used more than 2,100 silos and storage bins. But only a few dozen ever have been checked for contamination, and the USDA admits it hasn't located hundreds that were dismantled years ago.

No one has conducted comprehensive health studies to judge whether pollution harmed those who drank and breathed it.

"The USDA created a big problem here, but they haven't done a thing to fix it," said Dave Staley, water manager for Frankfort, a northeastern Kansas town of 850. "It's Washington bureaucrats. What can I say?"

Even before its main well turned bad, Frankfort, like many farm towns, was fighting for survival.

Since World War II, the town has lost half its population. Of the remaining residents, one of every three is 65 or older. The rundown opera house and bakery were torn down to make a parking lot for Main Street businesses that increasingly lose customers to a city shopping mall 48 miles away.

When USDA pollution first afflicted Frankfort in 1986, the town pressed two backup wells into service. But years of heavy pumping are taking a toll. In the past two years, water production from the backup wells dropped 60 percent, and town officials fear their supply is running dry.

Officials from another federal agency charge that the USDA works slowly.

Awaiting a "public outcry'

"The only way USDA will respond is if there's a public outcry," said Victor Lyke of the Kansas City regional office of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. "The USDA has not been easy to work with. They don't want to clean the sites willingly. They put out fires - damage control."

The manager of the USDA's pollution-response program conceded some problems but vowed to do better.

"A lot of this stuff happened 30 to 40 years ago, and there are very few records associated with it," said Steve Gilmore of the USDA in Washington. "We're doing the best we can with the funds we've been allocated."

The USDA official said his program typically gets $3 million to $5 million a year.

In this fight, there's more at stake than just safe tap water. Who to call?

For more information about how to test your home well for contamination, call Christopher Dann of the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment: (303) 692-3281. 

Rural officials worry that the stigma of pollution on their towns will make it even harder to withstand the farm economy's latest downturn. "It's very hard to keep a small-town community going these days," said Frankfort Mayor Sharon Owen. "We don't need to have bad water on top of everything else we're dealing with." 

From the front window of her six-room City Hall, the mayor sees her town's economic plight.

Where five grocery stores once thrived, only the J&R IGA survives today. The Kennedy Motors Ford dealership, which opened in 1915, stopped selling new cars last winter. The last new business in town, Elsie Grace's Gift and Bake Shop, opened three years ago.

Even the town's grain silo, once one of Kansas' largest, has been dismantled.

Like small-town economic woes, the roots of the carbon tetrachloride contamination problem run decades deep.

In the 1950s and 1960s, new fertilizers, pesticides and agricultural equipment boosted production of grain crops such as corn, wheat and milo. But soaring crop yields soon caused a market glut - and falling prices for farmers.

So the USDA, and its subsidiary, the Commodity Credit Corp., started buying tons of grain to help bolster prices. That grain was stockpiled at 4,400 silos, Quonset huts and bins across America.

To keep rodents and insects at bay, the Commodity Credit Corp. often doused grain - and the area around grain storage bins - with a chemical called Activated 80-20 Grain Fumigant. The fumigant was so powerful that a worker could spray it on top of a 100-foot grain elevator and know that the chemical would kill all pests, from top to bottom, within three days. 

In 1979 alone, the government and farmers sprayed 28 million pounds of the fumigant.

Activated 80-20 was 80 percent carbon tetrachloride, an industrial solvent.

The federal government banned the sale of carbon tetrachloride in 1985 for environmental reasons. By that time, streams of the chemical had seeped from the government grain storage bins into groundwater and dozens of home and community wells.

Health officials say it's unsafe to drink water laced with more than 5 parts per billion of carbon tetrachloride. But in parts of Kansas and Nebraska, some people unknowingly drank carbon tetrachloride at levels 100 times worse than the health standard, federal records show.

Carbon tetrachloride pollution is especially troublesome because it is hard for an average person to detect. At the concentrations found in most drinking-water wells, the chemical is colorless, odorless and tasteless. Well tests for it and other volatile organics can cost hundreds of dollars each.

The federal government requires city and town water supplies to be tested regularly for a variety of chemicals, including carbon tetrachloride. But there is no similar requirement for private wells. That means many rural homeowners don't check for carbon tetrachloride pollution.

That can be a risky omission. At low levels, carbon tetrachloride can cause serious liver and kidney damage. At extremely high levels, it causes comas and death. 

In Kansas and Nebraska, state officials regularly check water quality in the private wells of rural residents. That's how they found many USDA-polluted wells.

In Colorado, however, no such program exists. So it's unclear whether Colorado's rural residents are drinking polluted water from private wells, as was the case in neighboring states.

"We have no budget for that at all, and we have no statutory authority to do it," said David Holm, water quality manager for the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment.

Seven known locations

Colorado officials said carbon tetrachloride has been found in municipal water supplies of seven rural towns - Springfield, Burlington, Seibert, Bristol, Johnstown, Cheyenne Wells and Arriba - but the pollutant was at such low levels that it met the national health standard. 

A 1960 USDA memo listed 2,185 Commodity Credit Corp. silos with more than 8 million bushels of grain in Colorado. Many of those silos no longer exist, and the USDA has screened few former grain-storage sites for possible pollution. 

Denver regional EPA officials say they want to learn more about the issue in Colorado and call for more cooperation among federal, state and local officials to find tainted private wells.

"Our problem is finding the bull's-eye," said Sabrina Forrest of the Denver regional EPA office.

Residents and regulators in other states have struggled to persuade USDA to clean up its mess.

In Navarre, Kan., carbon tetrachloride was discovered at levels 50 times worse than health standards in 1990. It took three years before the USDA started supplying residents with bottled water for drinking and cooking.

Even then, residents said they still had to bathe in polluted water. A simple shower in contaminated water can be worse than drinking contaminated water, health studies show, because the hot water gives off a toxic gas that can be inhaled.

The USDA didn't get all Navarre residents a permanent, clean-water supply until April 2001 - 11 years after the pollution was discovered. The agency has announced no plans to clean up its Navarre pollution, which remains beneath homes.

In other neighborhoods across America, toxic gas from the same chemical wafted up from the groundwater and into living rooms, threatening residents' health.

But the USDA has yet to test a single home for toxic gas health threats. In fact, USDA program manager Gilmore said he was not familiar with toxic gas risks and requested a copy of a recent Denver Post news series on the issue.

The lingering contamination breeds fear among Navarre residents such as Jim Johnson, a retired artificial inseminator for a livestock company who raised four children in a home where the well was polluted with 373 parts per billion of carbon tetrachloride - 75 times worse than health standards.

"Our stomachs were hurting, but we didn't know anything," Johnson said. "Now when somebody here dies of cancer, you wonder: Was it the water that did it?"

Neither the state nor federal government has conducted health studies in areas polluted by the USDA.

The pollution also has exacted a heavy social toll. Fewer than 200 people live in Navarre, half as many as in the 1970s. The sole remaining business is the farmers' co-op, a former source of carbon tetrachloride.

Navarre residents with polluted wells now clash with farmers who sold the USDA the crops that led to so much pollution.

"It's just horrible what this pollution has done to our little town," said Naomia Johnson, Jim Johnson's wife of 48 years. "People are at each other. The president of the Lions Club called to give me hell. The co-op is the last thing going here, and they don't like it when it gets blamed for contaminating the water."

In Frankfort, town officials have tried for 16 years to make the USDA decontaminate the town's main well. 

At one point, the USDA suggested that the town take polluted water and mix it with clean water from the two replacement wells, state and local officials said, but the town rejected the plan.

"We want a good, clean water supply, just like we had before," said Owen, the Frankfort mayor. "What's so wrong about that?"
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Mark Obmascik can be reached at Mobmascik@denverpost.com or 303-820-1415. 

All contents Copyright 2002 The Denver Post or other copyright holders. se.

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Dirty tap water risk for pregnant women

January 8, 2002 Posted: 2:20 PM EST (1920 GMT)

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Millions of Americans have been drinking tap water contaminated with chemical byproducts from chlorine that are far more than what studies suggest may be safe for pregnant women, two environmental groups say in a new study. 

Chlorine is commonly used to disinfect drinking water. When it is added to water that contains organic matter such as runoff from farms or lawns, however, it can form compounds such as chloroform that can cause illness. 

The study released Tuesday by the Environmental Working Group and Public Interest Research Groups identified areas that may have increased health risks including miscarriage, neural tube defects and reduced fetal growth from women drinking chlorination byproducts. 

"By failing to clean up rivers and reservoirs that provide drinking water for hundreds of millions of Americans, EPA and the Congress have forced water utilities to chlorinate water that is contaminated with animal waste, sewage, fertilizer, algae and sediment," the report says. 

Jane Houlihan, EWG's research director, said the report also shows how that cleanup failure has "a direct impact on human health." Pregnant women need to drink plenty of water, she said, but they can reduce their exposure to potential risks through simple measures such as home filters and purchasing bottled water. 

One expert on environmental health cautioned that the link between the byproducts and pregnancy risks is suggestive, not conclusive. 

Still, if the pregnancy studies are proved, millions could be at risk, said Dr. Robert Morris, an environmental epidemiologist at Tufts University School of Medicine in Boston. 

"That body of literature isn't necessarily conclusive but people ought to be aware of it," Morris said. "It's pretty clear that some of these compounds can be pretty bad actors. The fact that these levels are as high as they are is certainly something to be concerned about." 

The environmental groups combed water quality records in 29 states and the District of Columbia and matched them with various research into birth defects and miscarriages conducted by state and federal agencies and universities. 

The groups said the places statistically most at risk due to chlorination byproducts were those that are populous, lacked buffers from urban sprawl and were downstream from agricultural sites. But women in small towns generally face twice the risk from drinking high levels of the byproducts, Houlihan said. 

Matching high rates doesn't prove the environmental risk caused the health problems, however. Also, the results are limited because, among other reasons, such health records do not exist in some states. 

The Environmental Protection Agency already has decided that some chlorination byproducts pose health risks and instituted stricter standards on January 1 for seven of them: five haloacetic acids, bromate and chlorite. The agency also began requiring a reduction by one-fifth of the allowable level for trihalomethanes, another chemical produced by adding chlorine to dirty water. 

EPA studies showed that reducing the level of trihalomethanes might mean 2,332 fewer cases of bladder cancer per year, down from its estimate of up to 9,300 annual cases caused by trihalomethanes. 

While the environmental groups said the majority of water suppliers were meeting the current and future drinking water health standards, they also found that since 1995 more than 11 million people in 1,044 communities were being served water contaminated with chlorination byproducts for 12 months in a row at levels above the new legal limit. 

To reduce the risks, the groups said, the federal government should provide billions of dollars more for cleaning up sources of contaminated water and providing more buffer areas that can filter potential contaminants from farmland and urban areas. 
Copyright 2002 The Associated Press. 

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Dog waste poses threat to water

For as long as the dog has been man's best friend, dog waste has posed a menace to man's nose and foot. Now science has revealed a more unsavory truth: It's an environmental pollutant.

In the mid-1990s, scientists perfected methods for tracking the origin of nasty bacteria in streams and seawater. From Clearwater, Fla., to Arlington, Va., to Boise the trail has led straight to the hunched-up dog — and to owners who don't pick up after their pets.

At some beaches, dogs help raise bacteria levels so high that visitors must stay out of the water. Goaded by such studies, some cities have directed as much as $10,000 in the last few years to encourage dog owners to clean up after their pets. A few municipalities have started issuing citations to those who ignore pet clean-up ordinances.

Many dog lovers are in denial about their pooches' leavings. But researchers have named the idea that areas used by dogs pump more bacteria into waterways — the "Fido hypothesis."

Dogs are only one of many fixtures of suburban America that add to water pollution. Lawn fertilizers, rinse water from driveways and motor oil commonly end up in streams and lakes.

But unlike those sources, dogs generate disease-causing bacteria that can make people sick. Studies done in the last few years put dogs third or fourth on the list of contributors to bacteria in contaminated waters. "Dogs are one of our usual suspects," says Valerie Harwood, a microbiologist at the University of South Florida. "At certain sites, we find their effect to be significant."

It doesn't take a Ph.D. to figure out that dog do is nasty. But it took science to determine how nasty it is.From mutt to blue-blooded champion, all dogs harbor so-called coliform bacteria, which live in the gut. The group includes E. coli, a bacterium that can cause disease, and fecal coliform bacteria, which spread through feces. Dogs also carry salmonella and giardia. Environmental officials use measurements of some of these bacteria as barometers of how much fecal matter has contaminated a body of water.

This wouldn't matter if pet dogs were as rare as pet chinchillas. But four in 10 U.S. households include at least one dog, according to the American Pet Products Manufacturers Association. The association's statistics also show that Americans owned 54.6 million dogs in 1996 and 68 million dogs in 2000. Of that total, 45% were "large" dogs — 40 pounds or more.

Those numbers add up to a lot of kibble. That wouldn't matter if all dog owners also owned a pooper-scooper. But several studies have found that roughly 40% of Americans don't pick up their dogs' feces (women are more likely to do so than men).
New analysis provides answers.

The environmental impact of dog waste went unrecognized for decades. Then scientists developed lab techniques to determine the origin of fecal bacteria contaminating water. One method is a variant of DNA fingerprinting. Another method looks at the antibiotic resistance of microbes from different species.

Scientists caution that the methods are still new. They are able to distinguish between major and minor sources of pollution, but they can't say with precision whether dogs contribute 20% or 30% of the pollution in a stream. "There's inherently some error," says Don Stoeckel, a microbiologist for the Ohio district of the U.S. Geological Survey who's studying bacteria-tracking methods. "I think the best (they) can do is give you some evidence of the magnitude of each source."

Nonetheless, Stoeckel says, the analytical tools do provide useful information. Researchers have studied dozens of waterways. Wild birds and humans usually head the roster of who's fouling the water. But in some areas, dogs make significant deposits.

	At Morro Bay, Calif., for example, dogs contribute roughly 10% of the E. coli, says Christopher Kitts, a microbiologist at California Polytechnic State University-San Luis Obispo. "And that can be the difference between a beach closing and a beach not closing," he says. Places where dogs dirty the water:
	Stevenson Creek in Clearwater, Fla. Residents were worried that a sewage treatment plant contaminated the creek. But when Harwood tested the water, she found that dogs, along with leaky septic tanks and wild animals, were to blame for high bacteria counts. Dog feces probably washed out of yards by the creek, Harwood says.
	Four Mile Run in Arlington and Fairfax counties, Va. Studies show that dogs add to the contamination in this suburban Washington, D.C. stream. Officials calculate that the 12,000 dogs living in Four Mile Run's watershed leave behind more than 5,000 pounds of "solid waste" every day.
	Boise River in Boise. The river suffers from high bacteria levels that make it unsuitable for swimming.Testing of streams and drainpipes flowing into the river showed that in urban areas, dogs were a leading culprit. In some spots, dogs and cats account for even more of the bacteria than human feces — from dysfunctional septic tanks and leaky sewage pipes — do.

Fines don't sway some

Even where dogs aren't the prime offenders, they're one of the few polluters authorities have control over. At many California beaches, for example, seagulls and other birds are most responsible for high bacteria levels. But federal laws protect birds.

That leaves dogs. Officials know that they have a lot of educating to do before people realize their pooch can be a canine sewage pipe. Some people find it humiliating to carry a plastic bag.
A survey by the Center for Watershed Protection in 1999 found that of the 41% of respondents who rarely or never clean up after their dogs, 44% would refuse to do so in the face of fines and neighbors' complaints. Reasons included, "because it eventually goes away," "small dog, small waste," and "just because."

So more cities may follow the lead of Laguna Beach, Calif., a wealthy beach enclave. The city provides pooper-scoopers at the local dog park. But many people "don't take care of their little friends," says Victor Hillstead, the city's parks and buildings manager.

So the city hired Entre-Manure, poop-scooping service based in nearby Dana Point whose motto is "#1 in the #2 Business." Since the city's contract started in January, the service has collected 187 pounds of dog waste from the city. "I'm real proud of that fact," says Craig Stern, founder and chief picker-upper. "That's pollution that'll never reach the ocean."

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Contaminated Tap Water

From: http://www.newsday.com/ 

By John Heilprin, Associated Press Writer, January 8, 2002 

Washington - Millions of Americans have been drinking tap water contaminated with chemical byproducts from chlorine that are far more than what studies suggest may be safe for pregnant women, two environmental groups say. 

Chlorine is commonly used to disinfect drinking water. When it is added to water that contains organic matter such as runoff from farms or lawns, however, it can form compounds such as chloroform that can cause illness. 

The study released Tuesday by the Environmental Working Group and Public Interest Research Groups identified areas that may have increased health risks including miscarriage, neural tube defects and reduced fetal growth from women drinking chlorination byproducts. 

"By failing to clean up rivers and reservoirs that provide drinking water for hundreds of millions of Americans, EPA and the Congress have forced water utilities to chlorinate water that is contaminated with animal waste, sewage, fertilizer, algae and sediment," the report says. 

Jane Houlihan, EWG's research director, said the report also shows how that cleanup failure has "a direct impact on human health." Pregnant women need to drink plenty of water, she said, but they can 
reduce their exposure to potential risks through simple measures such as home filters and purchasing bottled water. 

However, C.T. Howlett Jr., executive director of the Chlorine Chemistry Council, said government agencies found no compelling link between reproductive hazards and chlorinated water. 

He said chlorine has been added to drinking water for more than a century, and the environmental groups' study "may unnecessarily alarm the public and, in particular, pregnant women, about risks that are not supported by scientific evidence." 

Catherine C. Milbourn, a spokeswoman for the Environmental Protection Agency, said, "EPA has standards in place for these byproducts and has set even stricter standards in 2002 that local water providers are beginning to implement." 

Milbourn added that the EPA "has an ongoing health research program to provide additional scientific insight into the potential risks posed by disinfection byproducts." 

Still, if the pregnancy studies are proved, millions could be at risk, said Dr. Robert Morris, an environmental epidemiologist at Tufts University School of Medicine in Boston. 

"That body of literature isn't necessarily conclusive but people ought to be aware of it," Morris said. "It's pretty clear that some of these compounds can be pretty bad actors. The fact that these levels 
are as high as they are is certainly something to be concerned about."

The environmental groups combed water quality records in 29 states and the District of Columbia and matched them with various research into birth defects and miscarriages conducted by state and federal agencies and universities. 

The groups said the places statistically most at risk due to chlorination byproducts were those that are populous, lacked buffers from urban sprawl and were downstream from agricultural sites. But 
women in small towns generally face twice the risk from drinking high levels of the byproducts, Houlihan said. 

Matching high rates doesn't prove the environmental risk caused the health problems, however. Also, the results are limited because, among other reasons, such health records do not exist in some states. 

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Drugged Drinking Water

Environmental Health Perspectives Volume 108, Number 10, October 2000 

We should no longer think of water as a gift of nature 
but an industry which needs investment. 

o Drugged Drinking Water 
o Controversy Swirls around Toilet-to-Tap Project

Drugs and personal care products that are excreted from or washed off the body naturally end up in the sewage that flows into sewer systems and septic tanks, but where do they go from there? 

Scientists are beginning to monitor the extent of pharmaceutical and personal care products (PPCPs) in the aquatic environment and their consequences. What they're finding is that, through leaching from septic tanks and escaping intact through sewage treatment processes, some of these substances are ending up back in the drinking water. 

Germany has been at the forefront of PPCP monitoring. Studies conducted there during the past 10 years confirmed the presence of PPCPs in treated and untreated sewage effluent, surface water, groundwater, and drinking water. Most commonly found were anti-inflammatory and pain-killing drugs, cholesterol-lowering drugs, anticonvulsants, and sex hormones from oral contraceptives. Samples from 40 German rivers and streams turned up residues of 31 different PPCPs, according to a report presented at the March 2000 American Chemical Society meeting in San Francisco, California, by Thomas Ternes, a chemist at the Institute for Water Research and Water Technology in Wiesbaden. 
Researchers worldwide have discovered more than 60 different PPCPs in water sources, according to Christian Daughton, chief of the Environmental Chemistry Branch of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Environmental Sciences Division in Las Vegas, Nevada. In addition to the drugs noted above, the list includes antineoplastics, beta-blockers, bronchodilators, lipid regulators, hypnotics, antibiotics, antiseptics, X-ray contrast agents, sunscreen agents, caffeine, and fragrances such as synthetic musks. Most PPCPs are detected at concentrations ranging from parts per trillion to parts per billion, and originate in treated and untreated sewage, says Daughton, who coauthored an article on PPCPs in the December 1999 issue of EHP Supplements. 

North American researchers are just beginning to look at the issue of PPCPs. Studies presented at the June 2000 Emerging Issues Conference sponsored by the National Ground Water Association, held in Minneapolis, Minnesota, indicate that the problem exists here, too. For example, environmental scientist Chris Metcalfe of Trent University in Peterborough, Ontario, detected the drugs aspirin, ibuprofen, indomethacin, bezafibrate (a cholesterol regulator), and carbamazepine (an anticonvulsant) in 10 pre- and post-treatment samples from sewage treatment plants in eastern Canada. The sewage treatment process in place removed some drugs that were easily biodegradable or more amenable to removal by activated charcoal, degradative microbes, or sand filtration, but others were resistant to degradation. 

Metcalfe is just beginning to analyze the effects of cholesterol-lowering drugs, estrogens, and anticonvulsants on fish in the Great Lakes. All three drug types can potentially interfere with normal reproduction and development in fish living downstream from sewage treatment plants. His laboratory studies show that estrogen compounds at parts-per-trillion exposures feminize male fish and disrupt the development of the circulatory system, eyes, and bladder. He says it's too soon to know whether PPCPs adversely affect wild fish populations. 

In one of the first studies in the United States to report the occurrence of drugs in drinking water, environmental engineer Glen Boyd had his students at Tulane University in New Orleans, Louisiana, sample water from the Mississippi River, a local lake, and city tap water. Their preliminary experiment targeted the pain reliever naproxen, the sex hormone estrone, and clofibric acid, a major bioactive metabolite from certain anticholesterol drugs. All three were detected at varying concentrations in most of the samples. "The big unknown," says Boyd, "[is whether PPCPs] present a health concern now or in the future." He notes that, although the number of peer-reviewed papers on the topic is limited, government agencies concerned with water quality in the United States and professional organizations serving the water and wastewater communities are beginning to acknowledge PPCPs as an emerging environmental issue. 

The long-term outcome of humans ingesting subtherapeutic doses of numerous drugs as well as any dose at all of substances not meant to be ingested remains a major unaddressed issue. "In areas of water scarcity, we'll see more and more reuse of treated sewage to meet drinking water needs," predicts Daughton, thereby increasing the likelihood that PPCPs will end up in drinking water. Extensive monitoring of the occurrence of PPCPs and their concentration trends over time is required to ensure safe water supplies in the future. Then toxicologists need to determine if the kinds and amounts of PPCPs that occur affect people and other living creatures. This subject will require collaboration between the Food and Drug Administration and the EPA, says Daughton, since the former usually does not address environmental concerns and the latter generally does not deal with drug issues. -Carol Potera 

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Controversy Swirls around Toilet-to-Tap Project

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FBI says al-Qaida after water supply

In addition to the utility company warnings, the NIPC bulletin released Wednesday noted al-Qaida interest in “insecticides and pest control products at several Web sites.” 

Also according to the bulletin, a computer belonging to a bin Laden associate was found to contain structural architecture computer programs, including AutoCAD, CATIGE, Microstran and BEAM, “that suggested the individual was interested in structural engineering as it related to dams and other water-retaining structures.” 

The same unnamed individual had a program used to identify soil types using the Unified Soil Classification System, according to the bulletin. 

Earlier this month, a number of water supply experts conceded to MSNBC.com that the country’s 54,065 public and private water systems were indeed vulnerable.

“Although recognized in the past, the vulnerability of our water systems to deliberate acts has not received sufficient attention,” said Richard Luthy, chair of the Water Science and Technology Board of the National Research Council, in congressional testimony last year. “The reasons include the fact that simply developing and maintaining our existing water system received primary attention,” he said. 

U.S. water supply vulnerable

The darker angels of the water security issue are old, crumbling pipelines and treatment plants. The “reality is that many components of our water systems are aging and need repairs, replacement, or upgrades,” Luthy told Congress. 

The Association of Metropolitan Water Agencies has asked Congress for $57 billion over a five year period targeted at drinking water and wastewater infrastructure. 

MSNBC.com’s Bob Sullivan and the Associated Press contributed to this report.

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Outbreaks of The Toxic Pfiesteria Piscicida Micororanism

By Jeff Rubin
ABCNEWS.com
Oct. 9, 2001 — 

For the past 25 years, U.S. states have flouted a powerful provision of the federal Clean Water Act—and that neglect may have contributed to the recent outbreaks of the toxic Pfiesteria piscicida microorganism, the National Wildlife Federation says. 

Pfiesteria is blamed for killing millions of fish in Maryland, Virginia and North Carolina, and is suspected of causing illness—including short-term memory loss—in people. 

Specifically, states have not protected their water supplies—as they are required by law to do—from airborne pollutants, runoff from farms and overflows from city storm drains, the environmental group says in a new report. 

Addressing Only Half the Act After the Clean Water Act became law in October 1972, most states put in place tough controls The NWF report follows last week’s dismaying, first assessment by the EPA of the more than 2,000 watersheds in the United States. The EPA said that only 16 percent of the watersheds have good water quality and more than half face problems, 21 percent of them serious problems.

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2000 KANSAS WATER QUALITY ASSESSMENT

KDHE Home - Division of Environment - BEFS - 2000 KS Water Quality 
------------------------------------------------------------------------

March 31, 2000

Kansas Department of Health and Environment, Division of Environment
Bureau of Environmental Field Services
Forbes Field, Building 283, Topeka, Kansas 66620-0001

* Part I: Executive Summary/Overview
* Part II: Background
* Part III: Surface Water Assessment
* Part IV: Groundwater
* Appendix A: TSS Concentrations in Kansas Basins (link to image)
* Appendix B: Stream Assessment Protocol (link to image)
* Appendix C: Clean Lakes and Wetlands


This report, the 2000Kansas Water Quality Assessment, also known as the 305(b) Report, is the biennial assessment of the state's surface water quality as required by 33 USC 466 et seq, the Federal Water Pollution Control Act, commonly referred to as the Clean Water Act. The guidance by U. S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) for the preparation of this report provided three options for reporting. The Kansas Department of Health and Environment (KDHE) elected the second option which is to provide in even years, an electronic report accompanied by an abbreviated narrative report. The abbreviated narrative report contains only the information required by law that has changed from the last report (1998 Kansas Water Quality Assessment (305(b) Report), April 1998) and a simple reference to that report.

The Kansas Department of Health and Environment assessed the water quality for the period of 1998 -1999, of 18,236 miles of streams, all of which were considered monitored. This report represents an increase assessment of 2,616 miles from the 1998 305(b) Report. This increase in assessed miles is due to: 1) differences in mileage associated with rotational sites, and 2) increased monitoring in the Marais des Cygnes and Missouri River Basin in support of the establishment of Total Maximum Daily Loadings (TMDLs). A total of 188,508 lake acres were assessed. Of these, 175,454 acres were monitored and the conditions of an additional 13,052 lake acres were evaluated using best professional judgment. 

The 2000 Kansas Water Quality Assessment Report includes two years of data (1998-1999) and only acute aquatic life use support application. This assessment is consistent with the 1998 US EPA guidance and reflects the manner in which most states have prepared past 305(b) reports. The assessments contained in this report are consistent with the application of the numeric 1999 Kansas surface water quality standards with the exception of total suspended solids where a basin summary is included for streams for the two year period. 

The major causes of nonsupport for streams, in order of prevalence, are pathogen indicators (fecal coliform), organic enrichment, sulfates, chlorides, and metals. The major causes for lake impairments were sediments, turbidity, nutrients/eutrophication, and taste and odor problems 

Sources responsible for widespread pollutant loadings and beneficial use impairments of streams include agriculture (non-irrigated and irrigated crop production, and intensive animal feeding operations), natural sources, habitat modification, municipal point sources, and groundwater withdrawal. Major sources for lake impairment included natural sources and agriculture. 

Of the assessed lake acreage in Kansas, 53% were stable over time, while slightly more than 27% appeared to be undergoing measurable eutrophication over time. Almost twelve percent of total lake acres showed appreciable improvement in trophic state condition during this reporting cycle. Municipal point sources, natural sources, and agriculture were the primary contributing factors to lake eutrophication. 

The changes from the 1998 305(b) Report in the cumulative mileage rated as partially and fully supporting may be attributable to random fluctuations in climatological conditions. Specifically, increased rainfall and/or the number of rainfall events may have intensified nonpoint source impacts on water quality. Other variables may include application of total recoverable metal criteria throughout the entire state and the change in rotational sites assessed during this reporting period. Because of the use of rotational site no comparison can be made with the 1998 305(b) Report. 

High nitrate concentrations accounted for about 76% of the documented exceedences of the federal drinking water maximum contaminant levels (MCLs) during 1997 and 1999 for the groundwater monitoring network. The majority of the samples with excessive levels of nitrate were obtained from shallow wells (less than 100 feet) or in wells located in areas of sandy soil and high water tables. Other isolated concerns of groundwater contamination included the presence of volatile organic compounds, heavy metals, petroleum products and/or bacteria. The major sources of these contaminants included active industrial facilities, spills, leaking storage tanks, mineral extraction activities, and agricultural activities. 

In Kansas, approximately 68% of public water supplies use groundwater as their only source of water. Five percent of public water supplies use a combination of groundwater and surface water. The majority of MCL violations of public water supplies were due to high levels of bacteria and nitrate. The bacteria exceedences observed are not considered to be reflective of ambient groundwater. 

The imposition of more stringent permits limits and the resulting upgrades of municipal and industrial wastewater treatment facilities continue to result in notable improvements in surface water quality. As the number of point sources causing or contributing to significant water quality impairments continues to decline, future attention will necessarily shift to the remaining sources, primarily nonpoint source related water quality problems. It is anticipated that watershed pollution control efforts, predicated on the development of TMDLs and on the allocation of allowable pollutant loadings among point, nonpoint, and natural sources, will play an increasingly important role in the abatement of surface water pollution and improvement in water quality in Kansas. By June 30, 2000 Kansas will have established TMDLs for 48% of the water bodies listed in the 1998 Kansas 303(d) List. 

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Roanoke considers ultraviolet treatment system at Crystal Spring

Roanoke considers ultraviolet treatment system at Crystal Spring
Light may ease water shortage 

The state Health Department remains cautious about Roanoke using UV equipment on drinking water. 

By TODD JACKSON 
THE ROANOKE TIMES 

Man-made, high-powered sunshine could be used to increase Roanoke's dwindling water supply, but the drought must increase in severity first, according to the state Health Department. 

On Monday, city council approved an emergency plan that would increase the city's water supply as soon as possible by about 6 million gallons a day. The most significant aspect of the plan would allow the city to use its second largest water source, Crystal Spring, sooner than expected. 

Crystal Spring was shut down two years ago because of contamination issues, and a state-approved treatment plant improvement is under construction. 

The $6 million microfiltration system upgrade is expected to be finished in December. 

But with hot weather looming and the drought expected to continue, the city is scrambling to find a way to use the spring water right away. 

If the city could use Crystal Spring's 4 million gallons of water a day, it could reduce the draw from its main Carvins Cove reservoir by about one-third. 

The city wants to use ultraviolet light temporarily to help treat the spring water . Roanoke would be the first locality in Virginia to use the technology as a daily drinking water treatment, state officials said. 

UV treatment is not new, though - it's been used in Virginia by wastewater plants for years, and the technology is being used to treat drinking water in many states. 

"It's a case where the technology is ahead of the regulations," city Utilities Director Mike McEvoy said. 

The city asked the Virginia Health Department about the use of UV months ago, but the state remains cautious about Roanoke using UV equipment on drinking water because of Virginia's lack of a track record and the viability of Roanoke's other water options, said Ron Conner, local field director for the health department's Lexington office. 

The Health Department will likely approve Roanoke's use of UV, but only as a supplement to Crystal Spring's traditional treatment system that mainly uses chlorine as a disinfectant, Conner said. 

Also, the water level at Carvins Cove will have to drop to 30 feet below capacity before the UV treatment will become an option, he said. 

At that point, the cove would be lower than it has ever been and Roanoke would have already implemented several other options. 

The cove water level was 23.8 feet below capacity Tuesday. 

"Obviously, the sticking point is when we'll turn Crystal Spring on," McEvoy said. "The health department says 30 feet. We'd like to do it at 26." 

If the cove level drops to 26 feet below capacity, the city will impose a Roanoke-wide, mandatory outdoor watering ban and will also begin buying up to 4 million gallons of water a day from Roanoke County - sound actions that the Health Department believes should be implemented before the UV option, Conner said. 

State and city officials could have an agreement in place so the city could immediately turn on the spring when the cove level hits the 30-foot low mark, he said. 

The city proposes to rent UV equipment that's being used successfully elsewhere in the United States. 

"It works," said Joe Dinkel, the assistant director of Pennsylvania's West View Water Authority. 

The authority operates the largest UV treatment system in the country based on daily water usage, Dinkel said. West View, which treats more water than Roanoke on a daily basis, has been using UV for about a year. Dinkel said it's one of several treatment procedures the authority uses. 

"It's only an additional barrier," he said. 

The UV renders harmless the potentially deadly waterborne micro-organisms such as giardia and cryptosporidium. 

Simply put, at West View many UV bulbs are placed strategically in distribution pipes and the light zaps the water as it flows through the system. The technology scrambles the microorganisms' DNA so they cannot reproduce, which is how they harm the human body. 

The UV technology is usually cheaper than other treatment systems, Dinkel said. 

The West View authority looked at options that cost as much as $20 million, and the UV system, which cost about $600,000, he said. 

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Five Hidden Dangers of Your Morning Shower

U.S. News & World Report - July 29, 1991 -
“Is Your Water Safe - The Dangerous State of 
Your Water”!

Five Hidden Dangers of Your Morning Shower

Chlorine: Added to all municipal water supplies, this disinfectant hardens arteries, destroys proteins in the body, irritates skin and sinus conditions, and aggravates asthma, allergies, and respiratory problems.

Chloroform: This powerful by product of chlorination causes excessive free radical formation (accelerated aging!), normal cells to mutate, and cholesterol to oxidize. It’s a known carcinogen!

DCA (Dichloro acetic acid): This chlorine byproduct alters cholesterol metabolism and has been shown to cause liver cancer in lab animals.

MX (another chlorinated acid): Another byproduct of chlorination, MX is known to cause genetic mutations that can lead to cancer growth and has been found in all chlorinated water for which it was tested.

Proven cause of bladder and rectal cancer: Research has proven that chlorinated water is the direct cause of 9% of all bladder cancers and 15% of all rectal cancers in the US.

Dear Reader,

You wouldn’t knowingly bathe in toxins every morning ... or set out to ravage your lungs and sinuses, irritate your allergies, aggravate your skin, or ... perhaps most horrifying of all...

- Willingly increase your risk of cancer... would you? - 

Of course not. But the fact is, the chlorine in your shower water is a powerful toxin --- deadly to bacteria and fungi, and poison for your body. 

You absorb more chlorine in a 10-minute shower than by drinking 8 glasses of the same water! 

Tests show that your skin, the largest organ of your body, can absorb more chlorine as a result of a 10 minute shower than if you drank 8 glasses of the same water. How can that be?

A warm shower opens up your pores, causing your skin to act like a sponge. As a result, you not only inhale the chlorine vapors, you also absorb them through your skin, directly into your blood-stream -- at a rate that’s up to six times higher than drinking the water.

In terms of cumulative damage to your health, showering in chlorinated water is one of the most dangerous risks you take every day. In the short term, chlorinated shower water irritates your eyes, your sinuses, your throat, your skin, and your lungs. Long term risks include excessive free radical formation (which makes you age faster), higher vulnerability to genetic mutation and cancer development, difficulty metabolizing cholesterol and hardened arteries.

Showering in chlorine-treated water is a serious risk --- but it’s also one of the very few 
risks you can erase immediately. And it’s up to you to protect yourself.

100 years of cancer in the making

For almost 100 years, chlorine has been added to disinfect our municipal water supply. The level of chlorine in your area depends on the quality of your water supply, but even if there’s no noticeable taste or smell, the chlorine is present, as are the byproducts of chlorination, which include some of the most potent carcinogens known.

Research conducted jointly at Harvard University and the Medical College of Wisconsin found that chlorinated water was the direct cause of 9% of all bladder cancers and 15% of all rectal cancers in the U.S.

There’s also evidence that chlorine destroys protein in your body. As I’m sure you’re already aware, this disinfectant / bleach makes your hair and scalp dry, worsens dandruff and ruins tinted or chemically treated hair. But what you may not know is that if you suffer from any of the following, chlorinated water makes your condition worse. 

sinus conditions
allergies
skin rashes
emphysema 

But that’s just for starters.

More hazards of chlorinated water

When chlorine reacts with the organic matter already present in water (humus, the organic material formed from plant decay), toxic byproducts are formed. Chloroform, for example, causes cells to mutate and cholesterol to oxidize. Once used as an anesthetic, chloroform was banned by the FDA in 1976 when it was discovered to cause cancer.

“Even if there’s no noticeable taste or smell, the chlorine is present, as are the byproducts of chlorination, which include some of the most potent carcinogens known.” 

Another byproduct, MX. is considered the “single largest contributor” to the mutagenic potential (the ability of a substance to cause genetic mutations) of our municipal water supply, according to the Environmental Protection Agency. MX has shown up in every chlorinated water source for which it has been tested. DCA, another mutagen, alters cholesterol metabolism and has shown to cause liver cancer in lab animals.

The evidence is clear. The risks are tremendous. The advice is simple: Stop chlorinating your body!

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NSF International continues to gain recognition by consumers, health officials and the drinking water industry as the independent, third-party certifier for the drinking water treatment industry.

Chlorine is widely used by municipalities for water disinfection. However, chlorine in water has been shown to produce undesirable taste and odor as well as Trihalomethanes, a known carcinogen. Certified drinking water treatment devices have been categorized into the following categories based on effective reduction of chlorine throughout the life of the device:

CLASS I Reduces chlorine by 75% to 100%*
CLASS II Reduces chlorine by 50% to 74%
CLASS III Reduces chlorine by 25% to 49%

Particulate matter found in drinking water makes the water appear cloudy or turbid. Drinking water systems Certified for particulate reduction have demonstrated, through testing, that they reduce specified sized particles. Drinking water systems are certified as meeting one of the following categories:

CLASS I 0.5 to 1 micrometers (sub micron)
CLASS II 1 to 5 micrometers (extra-fine)*
CLASS III 5 to 15 micrometers (medium-fine)
CLASS IV 15 to 30 micrometers (fine)
CLASS V 30 to 50 micrometers (medium coarse)
CLASS VI 50 micrometers or larger (coarse)

Claims for the reduction of specific contaminants from drinking water (public or private), such contaminants being considered as established or potential health hazards, such hazardous contaminants may be microbiological, chemical or particulate (including filterable cysts in nature. It is recognized that a unit may be effective in controlling one or more of the contaminants, but it is NOT A REQUIREMENT that it control all of these contaminants. The specific contaminant challenged would be included in the listing under Standard 53. Included under this standard are:

VOCs are chemicals that vaporize easily from water into air. They are delivered from a variety of solvents, insecticides, household cleaning compounds, industrial wastes and underground storage tanks.

These chemicals may end up in the drinking water as a result of misapplication of agricultural chemicals, spills or industrial discharge during manufacturing.

NSF Standard 55 covers Ultraviolet Drinking Water Systems. The specific contaminants tested for under this Standard are:

NSF Standard 58 covers Reverse Osmosis Drinking Water Systems. The specific contaminants tested for under this standard are: