Ethylene Oxide/Sterigenics Updates

Articles Tagged with groundwater contamination

water-1154080_1920.jpgPFOA and PFOS belong to a family of “fluorinated organic chemicals”. They are dangerous to human health. Before virtually all production of these chemicals was halted in 2006 (due to health concerns), PFOA and PFOS were used in a number of industrial processes; to fight fires at airfields; and to make carpets, clothing, and fabrics for furniture.

Health officials warn that sustained exposure to even low levels of these chemicals may result in adverse health effects, most notably, testicular and kidney cancer; damage to liver tissue; negative effects to the immune system and thyroid; and developmental damage to fetuses during pregnancy and to breastfed infants, such as low birth weight, accelerated puberty and skeletal variations.

The EPA tells us that while the levels of PFOA and PFOS in the blood of people that have been tested have been decreasing in the 10+ years since production of these chemicals stopped, PFOA and PFOS still pose a threat to human health in specific locations where the chemicals were historically used and dumped, buried or spilled, and allowed to migrate into water systems. Such locations include:

I want to take a moment to recognize McHenry County, IL, and its Public Health Administrator, Michael Hill, for disclosing on the County’s website what it calls “Groundwater Contamination Incidents”. http://ow.ly/Gb7v30cyNOF

countryside-2252029_1920.jpgMcHenry, while a fast-developing county, is not far removed from its roots as essentially a rural community, where most residents drew their water directly from the ground, and so contaminated groundwater was a very big deal, indeed. It still is.

As you can see, McHenry and Hill have itemized 11 such “Incidents”, and interested citizens can click onto any one of them, and see a host of relevant documents, including environmental test results, newspaper articles, government correspondence, etc., as to each one of them. (I’m trusting that the County has identified all of the “Incidents” that it should, and that it adds new documents to each “Incident” page as they become available.)

compactor-681543_1280.jpgIf you live near a landfill, you need to be especially aware of the ways in which toxic chemicals from the landfill can threaten your family. For example:

·Groundwater contamination: Over time, rainwater mixes with the chemicals from the garbage dumped in the landfill and produces a “leachate”, a sort of toxic sludge that burrows its way down through the landfill and ultimately into the groundwater. (That is, unless there is adequate lining at the landfill’s bottom, which, for older landfills, is seldom present.) The leachate-contaminated groundwater then migrates in whatever direction nature takes it, possibly into a nearby neighborhood’s water supply.

·Methane Gas: The process of compacting landfill waste produces methane-a gas 21 times more potent than carbon dioxide. Methane is most dangerous if it blows out the side of a landfill-under the ground surface-and migrates into a nearby neighborhood, where it can collect in the confined spaces of homes, and create an explosion risk.

glass-of-water-252x300.jpgThe great majority of families in the rural United States, and many other families, besides, depend on water coming directly from the ground for their everyday living needs. The groundwater also furnishes an emergency supply of clean water all over the country, in the event of contamination of the public water supply by, for example, a catastrophic accident or terrorist attack. So all of us should care about keeping the groundwater clean and safe for human use.

Perhaps the greatest threat to the purity of our groundwater is industrial pollution–for example, factories that dump degreasing chemicals, solvents, plasticizers or volatile organic compounds; gas stations whose underground tanks leak petroleum; landfills whose unlined bottoms provide no barrier against the migration of toxic chemicals directly into the groundwater; and farming operations that saturate the ground with pesticides and herbicides that gradually sink into the groundwater.

The US Geological Survey (USGS) has compiled a list of the chemicals most frequently found to be contaminating the groundwater; the typical sources of those chemicals; and the threats to human health that they present. If your family depends upon the groundwater, please take a good look at this list. https://water.usgs.gov/edu/groundwater-contaminants.html

Thumbnail image for fb49346c015be8c88fa807dd31907a0b.jpgFifty percent of Americans depend on groundwater for daily use in their homes, i.e., drinking, showering, etc. Unfortunately, the quality and safety of our groundwater is under increasing threat from a variety of man-made sources, with potentially grave risk to the health of those in our family who may be exposed to the contamination. Please take a moment to consider whether you live near any of these common sources of groundwater contamination:

  • Old industrial sites: There are over 20,000 known abandoned and uncontrolled hazardous waste sites in the US. Many were the site years ago of the reckless disposal of toxic chemicals, which by now have had years to migrate into local groundwater.
  • Landfills: Many landfills-and especially those which accepted waste before 1980 — are a danger to groundwater. Why? Because these landfills typically accepted dangerous chemicals (even though it was forbidden) and were not lined at the bottom, to prevent leakage of the chemicals directly into groundwater.

Last year, the groundwater feeding a well located at the Portsmouth, New Hampshire Airport–which was one of several wells supplying water to the citizens of the City of Portsmouth–was found to be contaminated with dangerous levels of a chemical known as perfluorooctane sulfonic acid, or PFOS. The well is called the “Haven” well. The chemical detected at the Haven well is believed to have migrated to the groundwater supply after being sprayed for years at the Airport as part of a PFOS-containing firefighting foam. 1 The City had no choice but to shut down the Haven well so that no one drinking the City’s water would be exposed to the PFOS. Testing also showed that chemicals from the same family–perfluorooctanoic acid, or PFOA–had contaminated groundwater feeding two other city wells (“Smith” and “Harrison”), which were located to the south of Haven, although the levels detected at Smith and Harrison on that day were below the levels considered dangerous. So, the Smith and Harrison wells have not been shut down, and presumably continue to supply water to the City’s residents. New Hampshire’s Department of Environmental Services (DES) says it is on the job, that it is watching to see if greater levels of contamination are heading toward the Smith and Harrison wells, which would result in their shut down, too. Portsmouth’s mayor, for his part, is understandably concerned about the possibility of even greater impairment to his City’s water supply, but then suggests to his constituents that “we need to leave it to the experts to determine how concerned we need to be”. 1 Respectfully, Mr. Mayor, no you don’t need to do that, and in fact, you shouldn’t. Especially when something so dear as the integrity of your water supply is concerned, you and your constituents deserve not only rapid action to protect them, but also timely and accurate information. In short, you deserve the right to be involved. You can’t just trust that the “experts” are going to get the job done all by themselves. I have no reason to distrust DES here, but, after all, they are government bureaucrats, and my experience as an environmental lawyer over the last 15 years tells me that citizens must never trust that their government is as diligent in protecting them as it should be. For example, limited government budgets, changing government personal, competing government priorities, and political pressures often slow or even halt investigations into groundwater contamination, and clean-up efforts. The people of Portsmouth and their Mayor do not want to wake up years from now to find that they have a badly compromised water supply because their government couldn’t give it the attention that it should have. What’s the answer?  The Mayor is certainly correct when he says that he and his constituents are not environmental “experts”, so how is it that they should stick their noses in this problem, which is certainly scientifically complicated? Simple: public pressure. The people of Portsmouth do not have to pretend to be environmental “experts”, but they can be experts in demanding protection of their water supply and demanding a timely flow of information and action so that they can monitor whether or not their government is doing its job. No need to be anything but a concerned citizen to be that kind of an expert. We all understand that, when public and media attention stops, the priorities of those in government often change. They tend to move on to the next problem that is getting attention.  So, people of Portsmouth: don’t let that happen. Don’t let the government’s attention stray from the job of protecting your water supply. Specifically:

  1. Demand to know why the levels of PFOA’s detected in the Smith and Harrison wells are considered “safe” to drink. After all, PFOA’s are industrial chemicals. Why is any level safe?
  2. Demand that regular tests be taken of the Smith and Harrison wells, to see if they become contaminated beyond the levels already discovered. And insist that the test results be published immediately upon availability; the people should not have to make requests to get them.
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