Nebraska Takes on Nitrate Challenges

By: Duane Craig

Farmers and residents in the area of York, Nebraska met recently to discuss the elevating levels of nitrates being found in groundwater, according to this report. To date, 17 communities have had one or more administrative orders on their municipal water supplies for elevated nitrate levels. Nitrate levels in large areas of Nebraska exceed the 10 ppm threshold. Not only that, levels are continuing to escalate.

Elevating levels of nitrates have been expected for at least a decade, even with drastic reductions in the amount of nitrogen that farmers are using to grow crops. That’s because decades of extremely heavy fertilizer applications have loaded the soils with nitrates that continue to work their way into water supplies. Besides being more specific in the timing of nitrogen applications, changes to existing rules would trigger new management levels at increasingly lower nitrate levels. Some of the public water supplies being affected include those of York, Seward, Utica, Polk, Osceola, Gresham, Henderson, Exeter and nine others.

State will help with WA. residents well woes

April 13, 2010- State help is on the way for rural Lower Yakima Valley residents dealing with long-standing contamination in private drinking water wells. The funding includes $400,000 to treat water from contaminated wells, such as filtration systems, and $100,000 to develop a local plan to improve water quality and reduce nitrate contamination.

The money comes from the state toxics control account, funded by a tax on petroleum products, pesticides and certain chemicals. The $100,000 appropriation is generally interpreted as help for Yakima County government to create a groundwater management area in the Lower Valley.

More...

High Nitrate Levels in the Water Wells In This WA County

January 27, 2010 - Federal clean-water regulators will being seeking permission from a number of well owners in Yakima County, Washington to test their water for contamination. The aim is to identify the source of the problem and fix it.

More than 12 percent of wells in the Lower Yakima Valley have tested above the maximum contaminant levels of nitrates. Excessive nitrates can harm infants and people with compromised immune systems.

More

ANP Agrees to $5 Million Groundwater, Soil Cleanup in AZ

January 8, 2010- The U.S. Department of Justice, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and Apache Nitrogen Products, Inc. entered into a $5 million consent decree to remove toxic nitrates and perchlorates from groundwater and to monitor the progress. at the Apache Powder Superfund Site, near David.

Nitrates can cause blue baby syndrome and strangle infants and perchlorates have been found to cause fetal defects. By 1989 the company was providing bottled water to their neighbors and eventually the company would drill deep wells to provide uncontaminated water to St David residents.

More...

Community in Nebraska Deals with Nitrate in Drinking Water

September 10 - Residents of a peaceful place where children play tucked away in Sarpy County can't drink the water. That's the order the state slapped on the owner of the Sands Mobile Home Park after toxic levels of nitrate were found in the drinking water. Nitrate at unsafe levels can cause serious illness and even death in babies under the age of six months.

More...

Almost one-quarter of U.S. wells contaminated, report finds

March 27, 2009 - More than one in five private wells across the United States contains at least one contaminant that poses a threat to human health, according to a comprehensive study released Friday.

In New Jersey, some wells had contaminants such as arsenic, mercury, nitrates and volatile organic compounds that were found in levels the government does not consider safe for drinking.

The United States Geological Survey studied 2,167 privately owned wells across the country, including sites in New Jersey. Of the private wells studied, 23 percent contained at least one contaminant.

More . . .

EPA targets groundwater contamination in Yakima, Washington

November 6, 2008 - The federal Environmental Protection Agency has begun bringing together local, state and federal agencies in an effort to solve groundwater contamination in the Lower Yakima Valley.

The EPA action was prompted by a series of Yakima Herald-Republic stories published last month about the failure to remedy -- or even examine -- long-standing problems of nitrates contaminating small private wells.

The stories showed how local, state and federal agencies virtually ignored a study six years ago that found one in five of 195 wells tested outside five Lower Valley communities contained nitrates in excess of federal safety limits.

More . . .

Wells in Cape May County, New Jersey tainted with bacteriological, organic, inorganic or radiological contamination

From September 2002 to April 2007, over 3,000 wells in this county (51,000 statewide) were tested under the state’s Private Well Testing Act (PWTA), which requires well testing as part of real estate transactions. The law allows home buyers and tenants to be informed about the quality of their potable water supply.

According to the county Health Department Web site, there are 9,800 domestic wells in this county and the PWTA report estimates approximately 400,000 wells statewide.

Of the different types of contamination cited in the report, this county’s wells were most affected by the inorganic chemical – nitrate. Ninety-nine of the 3,058 test wells (3.2 percent) were found to have elevated nitrate levels.

More . . .

Tainted well water in Cape May, NJ

September 9, 2008 - According to a recently released state report, a number of wells in Cape May County are tainted with bacteriological, organic, inorganic or radiological contamination.

Of the different types of contamination cited in the report, this county’s wells were most affected by the inorganic chemical – nitrate. Ninety-nine of the 3,058 test wells (3.2 percent) were found to have elevated nitrate levels.

More . . .

New Jersey State: 1 in 8 Private Wells Contaminated

August 28, 2008 - One in eight private wells in New Jersey, tested during real estate transactions or by landlords from September 2002 to April 2007, violated at least one limit for drinking water contaminants, according to a new state report.

The contaminants include arsenic, mercury, nitrate, total coliform and fecal coliform, gross alpha particle activity (a measure of radioactivity) and volatile organic chemicals, according to the report.

More . . .