[Water_news] 4. DWR'S CALIFORNIA WATERNEWS-WATERQUALITY-3/26/09

Department of Water Resources

California Water News

A daily compilation of significant news articles and comment

 

March 26, 2009

 

4. Water Quality-

 

 

Drug traces found in fish near 5 sewage treatment plants

The study prompts the EPA to expand research to more than 150 locations. Experts downplay the risk to humans but cite danger to fish, frogs and other aquatic species.

Associated Press

 

County is cleaning up perchlorate

San Bernardino Sun

 

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Drug traces found in fish near 5 sewage treatment plants

The study prompts the EPA to expand research to more than 150 locations. Experts downplay the risk to humans but cite danger to fish, frogs and other aquatic species.

Associated Press – 3/26/09

 

Fish caught near wastewater treatment plants serving five major U.S. cities had residues of pharmaceuticals in them, including medicines used to treat high cholesterol, allergies, high blood pressure, bipolar disorder and depression, researchers reported Wednesday.

Findings from this first nationwide study of human drugs in fish tissue have prompted the Environmental Protection Agency to expand similar research to more than 150 locations.

 

"The average person hopefully will see this type of a study and see the importance of us thinking about water that we use every day -- where does it come from, where does it go to?" said study coauthor Bryan Brooks, a Baylor University researcher.

A person would have to eat hundreds of thousands of fish dinners to get even a single therapeutic dose, Brooks said. But researchers have found that even extremely diluted concentrations of pharmaceutical residues can harm fish, frogs and other aquatic species because of their constant exposure to contaminated water.

The research was published online by the journal Environmental Toxicology and Chemistry and presented at a meeting of the American Chemical Society in Salt Lake City.

Brooks and his colleague Kevin Chambliss tested fish caught in rivers where wastewater treatment plants release treated sewage in Chicago, Dallas, Phoenix, Philadelphia and Orlando, Fla. Research has confirmed that fish absorb medicines because the rivers they live in are contaminated with traces of drugs that are not removed in sewage treatment. Much of the contamination comes from the residues of pharmaceuticals that people have taken and excreted; unused medications dumped down toilets also contribute to the problem.

They found trace concentrations of seven drugs and two soap scent chemicals in fish at all five of the urban river sites studied. #

http://www.latimes.com/news/science/environment/la-na-fish-drugs26-2009mar26,0,7764459.story?track=rss

 

County is cleaning up perchlorate

San Bernardino Sun – 3/25/09

Supervisor Josie Gonzales

The County of San Bernardino will clean up any perchlorate in local groundwater for which it is found responsible. It is that simple.

 

The county has already spent $13million over the past several years treating perchlorate and supplying clean water to Rialto residents. The county's treatment system is in place to capture any perchlorate determined to be emanating from county property purchased in 1993 for the future expansion of the Mid-Valley Landfill. Over the next several decades, the county will likely spend more than $60 million on the operation of the treatment facility.

 

Perchlorate was first detected in groundwater in the Rialto Colton Basin in 1997. But to date, the county is the only potentially responsible party to start a groundwater cleanup.

 

From day one, the county has focused its resources on fixing the problem, rather than litigation. That is why the county has settled with the cities of Rialto and Colton.

That is why the county has a draft settlement with the State Regional Water Quality Control Board to memorialize the county's ongoing efforts to capture and treat the western perchlorate plume. That is why county lawyers are playing an active role in settlement negotiations between the state and the other potentially responsible parties on finding a solution to the eastern perchlorate plume.

 

The county is leading this cleanup even though the county never manufactured any perchlorate-containing materials and never introduced any perchlorate into the soils. It is just the right thing to do.

 

I have held elected office long enough to understand that doing the right thing does not protect one from criticism or false allegations. All I can do in response is continue to tell you the truth about the county's efforts to protect Rialto and Colton's water supply.

 

The latest unfounded claim is that the county illegally demolished and buried a hazardous waste-disposal facility that Broco Inc. once operated on a portion of the county property.

 

Before the county purchased property in north Rialto for the future expansion of the Mid-Valley Landfill, the county hired an expert to test the land for hazardous materials. Those tests did not find significant contamination in the soil or groundwater.

 

These tests were conducted, however, before perchlorate was identified as a potential pollutant.

 

Once perchlorate became known as an issue in the area in 1997, the county proceeded to test all of its groundwater wells and hired an expert environmental consulting firm to test the soils at the site. This testing indicated that the county expansion property was not a threat to groundwater from perchlorate or other substances.

After an extensive public permitting process, contractors began to prepare the county property for future landfill expansion.

 

Former storage bunkers were demolished and some of the material from the bunkers was used to create visual berms around a sand and gravel mining operation. The site is being mined to create holes that will eventually hold trash. Those holes will be lined to protect the groundwater from potential contamination from the trash.

Clean dirt has temporarily been stockpiled on top of the former Broco burn pit, which is a suspected source of perchlorate.

 

The soil stockpile limits the risk of water flushing any perchlorate in the soil under the burn pit into the groundwater supply.

Unfortunately, the county did not learn until 2002 that Broco did not properly close its site. Since then, the county has worked closely with the state on a final plan for the closure of the Broco site.

 

More than 200 soil samples, collected under state oversight, have not detected perchlorate. In three percent of all the soil tests, perchlorate was detected in trace amounts or in low concentrations.

 

These test results are public documents for anyone to review. The county's closure plan will fully protect human health concerns and the environment.

And, if for any reason perchlorate from the Broco site has reached the groundwater beneath it, the county's treatment system has been in place for nearly three years to capture and treat it.

 

The county remains strongly committed to finding a solution to the perchlorate problem in the basin, avoiding the continuing drain of public and private resources on http://www.sbsun.com/pointofview/ci_11996886

 

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