By: Maddie Sargent, Anna Garvey, Davis Powel, Elle Shadik, Abbey Moran Water Contamination By: Maddie Sargent, Anna Garvey, Davis Powel, Elle Shadik, Abbey Moran

Hinkley California In Hinkley California, the Pacific gas and electric company dumped about 370M gallons of chromium (wastewater) into the ponds around the town. This contaminated all the water making it unsafe to drink.

Pollution The type of pollution is water contamination. Chromium 6 has affected the lakes and streams making the water undrinkable. The chemical has affected an 8 mile long groundwater source.

Impacted environment and people If humans drink the contaminated water, they will get sick. In some cases people have died from the exposure to carcinogen. In other cases, cancers have been reported. Many of the residents have moved out of Hinckley, so the property values have dropped.

Remediation The Pacific Gas and Electric Company spend over $750 million on cleanup. Sheryl Bilbery, the person in charge of the cleanup, said that the remediation process is taking a long time because it’s a very complicated process, and they want to get everything right. The town also raised water bills from $35 to $150 for filtering, disposal, and operational services.

Legislation laws The state of California is working on a law to prevent more chromium from being dumped into the lakes but officials have not come out with it yet. The California health guideline is working on making the regulation as close to the public health as possible.