Section 5.1

 Cars  Refrigerators  Plastics  Pesticides  Gasoline,  Jelwelry  Cosmetics

 Hazardous wastes  Toxic chemicals  Released  Buried  Burned  That can contaminate water supplies

 Over 37,000 sites contaminated  More than 1,400 of these at included on the NPL  Some sites require help for cleanup and disposal  A Superfund account was created for those sites with no responsible party

 1890 William T. Love constructed a canal for hydroelectric power in Niagra Falls, NY  Project was never completed and sat there  1947 Hooker Chemical Corporation dumped toxic chemicals in the area until 1952  Property was then filled and sold to the school board for $1.00!!!  Built elementary school and playground over the canal

 A developer then built houses along the filled canal  In 1976 heavy rains caused chemicals in drums to leak and rise to the surface, seeping into basements  Miscarriages, birth defects, various cancers and other health problems were reported  1978 & 1980, President Carter declared federal emergencies  School was closed and 950 families evacuated from a 10-square block

 School and homes were torn down and buried  The dumpsite has been covered with a clay cap and a drainage system installed to drain any leaking water.  It then passes through a special treatment plant and the area is closed off  Occidental Chemical Corporation purchased Hooker Chemical and reimbursed EPA $129 million  This event spurred the creation of the SUPERFUND

 Woburn, Massachusetts was the site of a leukemia cluster between 1969 and 1979  Disease cluster occurs when people living or working in the same area develop the same disease  There were twelve cases in Woburn, about 7 cases more than what would normally be expected  Highly publicized lawsuit against three companies for dumping organic chemicals, trichloroethylene and tetraethylene

 The families claimed that the chemicals caused the leukemia by contaminating the drinking water  Jury found W.R. Grace guilty – this was a civil case!  21 cases of childhood leukemia out of 35,000 residents by 1986  A study concluded that mothers drinking the water during pregnancy led to the leukemia  The risk declined after the wells were shut down  In 1982 the wells were placed on the National Priorities List of Superfund sites

 Some fish contain toxic chemicals in their bodies, and there are warnings about eating fish from those areas  Only certain species of fish and certain lakes/rivers have the advisories  100% of the Great Lakes and connecting waters  Toxics such as mercury, PCBs, and chlordane  Carinogens affect fish livers in the same way they affect human livers

 In areas where fish have tumors, there are human cancer rates significantly higher than the national averages  Fish are therefore an indicator of the health of the environment  In Florida minnows are used in a short time period to determine toxicity of substances  Biomonitoring is the use of living organisms to determine water quality  There are two advantages of biomonitoring

 1. Allows scientists to study the effect of changing environmental conditions  2. Provides information about combinations of harmful substances (and possible synergism)

 Part of the Hudson River is contaminated with PCBs, which is why the city obtains its drinking water from reservoirs upstate  New Orleans gets its drinking water from the Mississippi River  Cleaning the Mississippi is not an easy task – there are more than 100 major industries that release toxics  There’s also runoff, contaminated groundwater with nitrates, pesticides and sewage overflows

 Chemicals and oils are stored in USTs  When they leak they contaminate the soils and groundwater beneath  USTs are now required to have spill, overflow, and corrosion protection  Cleanup is expensive!  Gasoline that floats on surface of groundwater can be pumped, but benzene is water soluble and is a carcinogen  Can be passed through activated carbon filter

 California’s farm land used to be part of sea floor and has naturally high amount of mineral salts  Salt is often left behind after groundwater is used for irrigation  Salinization – a buildup of salts on crops, reduces crop yields

 Lead is dangerous to fetuses and young children, slowing their neural development  Short periods of lead exposure can cause attention problems, hearing and learning problems  Long term exposure can cause kidney disease, stroke and cancer  Water pipes were at one time made of lead  Acidic water causes corrosion of pipes, which were banned from being made of lead in 1986

 Surface water is much cleaner than in 1972 because rivers are no longer used as sewers  However, toxics continue to poison our water  In 2004 industries reported release of 241 million pounds of toxics released from point sources  Additional toxics enter through non-point sources  Reducing or eliminating the use of toxics may be the best way  Cleaning up our water will require greater attention. The goal of the Clean Water Act was zero discharge…was this realistic?