Floridians need water education

Save the Water™ does not represent or endorse the postings herein or reliability of any advice, opinion, statement, or other information furnished by the author.

Let’s talk about water; every drop counts.

It’s hard to imagine life without it.

We drink it, we bathe in it and we swim in it.

Here in Florida, water appears plentiful.

Is it really, though?

The reality is that clean drinking water is far from plentiful. And an even more unfortunate fact – if you ask the average Floridian, they would have no idea.

Sure, Florida is surrounded by a gulf and an ocean and filled with thousands of rivers, lakes, springs and wetlands. And when it rains, it pours – but we can’t drink it.

For such a big issue, it’s commonly overlooked by the general public. Water conservation is a rising issue in politics that has proliferated marketing, advertising, public relations and other social campaign initiatives nationwide. This hot topic is sometimes called hydropolitics, meaning politics affected by the availability of water and water resources. Water has even been referred to as the “next hot commodity,” much like oil is today. So why doesn’t the general public know or care?

We can’t create more water. While the global water supply is rapidly diminishing, the population continues to grow. The human race relies on a finite supply of fresh water to live. We know what this means from some simple high school economics: supply and demand. With this exploding population growth, especially in underdeveloped countries, these limited supplies are quickly consumed.

Don’t get too comfortable, Florida. Developed countries aren’t immune to fresh water problems either. One study showed a 600 percent increase in water use compared to only a 200 percent increase in population size in the United States since 1990. This is a pretty big deal. We are talking about a prerequisite to the sustainability of all forms of life. Clearly, some big changes need to happen here.

Sure we have the watering restrictions, but sadly, many don’t follow them at all. Does everyone in your neighborhood skip watering the lawn every time it rains?

Seminole County’s drinking water is pumped from groundwater. We pull 99 percent of our water from the Floridan Aquifer. As the population grows, we are impacting the aquifer more and more. This impact creates a ripple effect that reaches our lakes, springs and wetlands, which defines our state’s beauty and throws a wrench in countless ecosystems. Not to mention, getting closer to the possibility of decreased water quality, saltwater intrusion and an increased frequency of sinkholes for our future.

We need water education. We need to put the issue into perspective. We need to tell Florida that although 75 percent of Earth is covered in water, less than 3 percent of that is fresh and 70 percent of the fresh water is ice. Then factor in pollution making some water unusable, and don’t forget the irrigation and industry uses. What’s left for human consumption? Less than 0.08 percent. Yet, the general public seems to think that water is a commodity that we will always have at our fingertips.

Anyone can make a difference whether it’s a shorter shower or less time watering your lawn. The most important part is spreading the word – and acting on it. Don’t quit these changes like we quit diets. Start today.

Whether you see the glass as half full or half empty, just remember that when you drink it, water is a privilege, not a right.

Benjamin Franklin said, “When the well is dry, we know the worth of water.” Let’s prove him wrong, Florida.

this article courtesy of Seminole Chronicle

Water shortages will leave world in dire straits

Waste and inadequate management of water are the main culprits behind growing problems, particularly in poverty-ridden regions, says the study, the most comprehensive of its kind. The United Nations Environment Programme, working with more than 200 water resource experts worldwide, produced the report.

“Tens of millions of people don’t have access to safe water. It is indeed a crisis,” says Halifa Drammeh, who coordinates UNEP’s water policies. The wide-ranging report, part of the UN’s designation of 2003 as the International Year of Freshwater, also documents problems such as steep drops in the size of Asia’s Aral Sea, Africa’s Lake Chad and Iraq’s Marshlands; the deterioration of coral reefs; and the rise of coastal waters because of climate changes. Some developing nations could face water shortages, crop failures and conflict over shrinking lakes and rivers if nothing is done to prevent wasteful irrigation and slow evaporation from reservoirs, and drinking-water systems are not repaired.

Based on data from NASA, the World Health Organization and other agencies, the report finds:

• Severe water shortages affecting at least 400 million people today will affect 4 billion people by 2050. Southwestern states such as Arizona will face other severe freshwater shortages by 2025.
• Adequate sanitation facilities are lacking for 2.4 billion people, about 40% of humankind.
• Half of all coastal regions, where 1 billion people live, have degraded through overdevelopment or pollution.

“The basic problem is poverty, not water,” says water resources economist Chuck Howe of the University of Colorado in Boulder. About 90% of the severe problems are in developing nations, he says, where solutions to wasting water lie in better irrigation and water supply practices.

In developed nations such as Japan, the USA and in Europe, most water shortfalls arise from politically popular but inefficient subsidies and protections of agriculture, which accounts for 85% of freshwater consumption worldwide.

Along with drinking-water concerns, the report looks at global problems of oceans and seas:

• Coral reefs, mangrove forests and sea grass beds, important grounds for young fish and for environmental needs, face threats from overfishing, development and pollution.
• Oxygen-depleted seas, caused by industrial and agricultural runoff, could lead to fishery collapses and “dead zones” in such places as the Gulf of Mexico.
• Wild-fish catches are leveling off worldwide. With 75% of fish stocks fully exploited, fleets have turned to fish lower on ocean food chains. Ecologists worry that entire fisheries will collapse as these “junk fish” are used up. Increased demand for fish is being made up through aquaculture, which brings other environmental concerns.

Drammeh hopes the report helps mobilize support for international organizations brokering water and fishery agreements that encourage better water management among nations. Developing regions don’t need more dam-building projects, he says, but need more people trained to manage water systems.

this article courtesy of Dan Vergano, USA TODAY

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In land of gas drilling, battle for water that doesn’t reek or fizz

Save the Water™ does not represent or endorse the postings herein or reliability of any advice, opinion, statement, or other information furnished by the author.

By Dan Frosch / Published: June 2, 2012

For the last few years, a small group of farmers and landowners scattered across this rural Wyoming basin have complained that their water wells have been contaminated with chemicals from a controversial drilling technique known as hydraulic fracturing, or fracking.

A draft report by the Environmental Protection Agency, issued in December, appeared to confirm their concerns, linking chemicals in local groundwater to gas drilling.

But here on the front lines of the battle over fracking, which has become an increasingly popular technique to extract previously unobtainable reserves of oil and gas, no conclusion is yet definitive.

After an outcry from Wyoming’s governor, Matt Mead, and the energy industry that the federal report was premature and inconclusive, more testing was conducted by the United States Geological Survey and is being processed. The E.P.A. is also in the midst of collecting additional water samples for study.

In the meantime, the state has offered to provide cisterns for local residents, using $750,000 allocated by the Wyoming Legislature this year. Under the plan, people here would still have to pay a fee to have their water hauled from the nearby community of Pavillion, at a cost that could run more than $150 per month.

“I’d like to have the industry held accountable for once,” said Jeff Locker, a hay and barley farmer who said that his well water had gone bad around the mid-’90s and that the contaminants had contributed to his wife’s neuropathy. “We’ve got scientific proof. And they’re still turning their back on us. They expect us to pay between $100 and $200 for something we didn’t cause. It gets under my skin.”

Encana Oil and Gas (U.S.A.) Inc., which bought the Pavillion gas field in 2004 and operates about 125 gas wells in the area, is already providing jugs of drinking water for Mr. Locker and 20 other households. It is unclear whether Encana will defray any of the cost of the cistern water.

“Until there is a peer-reviewed study and a good scientific basis that indicates that the issues related to water are related to our operations, that is not something we are ready to address,” said Doug Hock, an Encana spokesman.

Encana has maintained that water in the area is naturally poor and that its operations did not cause the problems — fracking had also occurred before the company purchased the gas field. Moreover, the energy industry has steadfastly pointed out that there has never been any conclusive link between fracking and water contamination.

Mr. Hock said it should have come as no surprise that the E.P.A.’s two monitoring wells showed high levels of methane and benzene because they were drilled deep into a natural gas field.

But some locals say the draft report’s analysis of water samples, which identified synthetic chemicals consistent with natural gas drilling and hydraulic fracturing fluids, is proof of what they suspected for years.

“These are people that had good water,” said John Fenton, a barrel-chested farmer and chairman of the Pavillion Area Concerned Citizens group. “And it changed when there was this rush to come in here and develop the area when they didn’t understand the geology.”

Mr. Fenton said he thought he had dodged a bullet until about three years ago, when his tap water began occasionally fizzing and smelling like petroleum. And even though Encana is giving him drinking water, Mr. Fenton said he and his family still bathe in dirty water.

Renny MacKay, a spokesman for Mr. Mead, said the governor was committed to figuring out a long-term fix for about 20 homes whose water was found to contain contaminants while the source of the pollution is studied.

“The governor believes let’s get more data points, let’s do more science on this that is peer reviewed and whatever the conclusion, you go from there,” he said.

At a meeting at the town high school on Thursday night, state environmental and water officials explained how the cisterns would work to about 50 people in attendance.

Some worried about their property values being deflated because of the attention the water contamination had drawn.

“Most of the property out here is fine,” said Jon Martin, a local landowner. “There’s nothing wrong with it. This is a shallow gas field. When you pass 200 feet, you’re liable to hit natural gas. This isn’t a fracking problem.”

Most residents seemed open to installing cisterns, peppering the officials with questions. How much would it cost? Was this the only option? And what of the additional water samples drawn by the United States Geological Survey, whose results will be released this fall, and the E.P.A.’s draft report and new data, which will be reviewed by an independent panel? For now, there were plenty of unknowns.

Louis Meeks, a landowner whose tap water reeks like diesel fuel, listened quietly. He said he had been trying to clean his water for years to no avail, and no longer lets his granddaughter wash her clothes or bathe in his home. Recently, Mr. Meeks printed business cards for anyone interested in his predicament. A glass of water is pictured prominently.

“Fresh, fizzy … Fracked,” the cards read.

Research Material
Contamination From Drilling

The Environmental Protection Agency in 1987 concluded that a water well in Jackson County, W.Va., had been contaminated with fluid used in a drilling technique known as hydraulic fracturing. Some drilling experts say that older wells in the area could have served as pathways for the fluid.

 

A natural gas drilling technique could have been the cause

1.During hydraulic fracturing, a mixture of water, sand and chemicals is injected into the well at high pressure to break up rock formations and release the gas. The pressure can create underground fractures that extend as much as 2,500 feet horizontally.

2.The mixture, which often contains gel, could have entered an abandoned well through breaks in the casing or cement.

3.Pressure from the water and gas used in hydraulic fracturing could then have pushed the mixture up the abandoned well and into the aquifer.

Other possibilities

A gel substance is often used during drilling to help lift pieces of rock created as the bit goes through the formation. The gel could have leaked into the aquifer during drilling and before fracturing.

Gel was also used to plug two of the four abandoned wells in the area. Over the years, it could have seeped up through one or both of those wells, breaking through corroded casing or a cracked cement plug.

By Frank O’Connell and Haeyoun ParkRANK /|Published: August 3, 2011 Sources: Environmental Working Group; Environmental Protection Agency; State of West Virginia, Department of Mines, Oil and Gas Division; A. R. Ingraffea, Cornell University

Drilling down

Documents: A case of fracking related contamination

Over the past seven months, The Times reviewed several thousand pages of documents related to natural gas extraction, focusing on a case where hydraulic fracturing is believed to have contaminated a family’s water well. The most important of the documents are provided here, with key sections highlighted and annotated to explain their meaning.

Explore the documents

Documenting the contamination: “The Parsons’ Case”

• 1987 E.P.A. Report Documents Water Contamination
• Summary of Parsons’ Case
• State Water Testing Results Show Contamination
• Gel Linked to Drilling Industry, State Official Suspects

The Industry Responds

• A.P.I. Points to Fracking as Cause of Parsons’ Contamination
• Industry Associations Dispute E.P.A.’s Conclusion
• A.P.I. Questions E.P.A. Contractor, Methods

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