DANGEROUS DRINK?: The EWG worries that the unregulated chemicals in tap water could do long-term damage.
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A three-year study of the nation's drinking water quality has found more than 200 unregulated chemicals in the tap water of 45 states.
The Environmental Working Group analysis of 20 million tap water quality tests found a total of 316 contaminants -- including industrial solvents, weed killers, refrigerants and the rocket fuel component perchlorate -- in water supplied to the public between 2004 and 2009.
U.S. EPA regulates 114 of those pollutants, setting maximum legal levels that water utilities achieved 92 percent of the time, according to the study.
EWG frets that the remaining chemicals, which have no mandatory federal safety standards, can come in potentially toxic combinations for long-term consumption.
"Utilities do the best job that they can treating a big problem with limited resources, but we must do better," said Jane Houlihan, the group's senior vice president for research. "It is not uncommon for people to drink tap water laced with 20 or 30 chemical contaminants. This water may be legal, but it raises serious health concerns."
The pollutants derive from a wealth of sources, including agriculture, factory discharges, consumer products, urban runoff and wastewater treatment plants.
The annual water quality reports that utilities are required to send customers provide a partial picture, the study says, as they contain no information on unregulated chemicals. They also provide average levels of most contaminants, which do not reveal if there were short periods when chemicals spiked past legal limits.
EPA in September said it was considering regulating 104 additional chemicals in tap water, including pesticides, commercial chemicals, disinfection byproducts, and for the first time, pharmaceuticals.
The list was the longest ever compiled by the agency under a 1996 law requiring it to evaluate possible tap-water pollutants every five years and make regulatory determinations for at least five of them.
EPA said it will continue to research the contaminants and will determine by 2013 whether to propose drinking water regulations for some of them.
The EWG study says the nation should adopt new policies for drinking water that include regulating more contaminants and spending more money on measures that prevent pollution.
While water utilities across the country spend more than $50 billion a year to treat drinking water, the nation spends $207 million a year to protect source waters and prevent pollution from sources such as urban runoff, the study says.
The report recommends investing more money in conserving land in buffer zones around public water supplies.
It also suggests that EPA "greatly expand" requirements for testing water for unregulated contaminants and that Congress provide more money to get the testing done.
Reprinted from Greenwire with permission from Environment & Energy Publishing, LLC. www.eenews.net, 202-628-6500
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9 Comments
Add Commentwow....I'm surprised we're not all dropping like flies.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thiswow...I'm surprised we're not all dropping like flies!
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe deleterious affect of contaminants in drinking water are clearly understated, in my opinion? Why? The human body, by weight, is mostly water. The enzymatic and other biochemical reactions that take place in the body take place in the water environment. As a result of the aforementioned, an significant increase in errors of bio-metabolism concomitant with the long term deleterious affects of the same will result in an significant increase in morbidity and mortality.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe urgent and assertive need to address this issue, as the article admirably states, is, therefore apparent.
For the individual, it imperative that you purchase a good water filter to ameliorate the adverse short term and long term consequences of the same on your health.
dvaudio: In West Virginia, because of the high contration of pollution runoff from coal and natural gas extracion, people are vertually dropping like flies. Doctor offices are packed with people every day, seven days a week and they suffer from a large aray of different ailments. Chronic childhood diseases are in epidemit porpitions here and the government turns the other way in dealing with the proplem because the coal and natural gas companies bought off the government to keep their mouths shut about. We have a patsy senator named (R) Capito who have convienced the illiterate that coal is clean and carbon neutral and the polluted water runoff is safe to drink. She is even going to attend the Summit to try and convience the EPA of the same fact and to turn their head when it comes to coal and natural gas because that is the only jobs West Virginia can provide for the people and the people are expendable. The world needs coal and natural gas, which produces radioactive waste water, to lessen our dependance on foreigh oil. If you are religious, you would swear to God that West Virginia is the most evil state in America and care the less about its people and environment.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisApparently you have the information so why didn't you rank the states, or at least list the safe five?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisHow is the situation improved by boiling the water before drinking it?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe question I find myself asking is how effective are household filters at removing said contaminants? If removing these chemicals was so easy as passing the water through a simple carbon filter don't you think the treatment plants could easily remedy all the extra contamination before it ever became an issue?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisBoiling only kills biotics.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe solution is right in front of you!
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisSTOP DRINKING WATER!