[Pharmwaste] Re: Pharmwaste Digest, Vol 124, Issue 12

Lawernce Kenemore Jr. ldkjr100 at gmail.com
Tue Feb 9 10:32:48 EST 2016


Finding the Medicine Cabinet in Groundwater.....just as we have said at
Stat-Medicament-Disposal Corp....we need to get into the homes where the
problem is.

On Tue, Feb 9, 2016 at 8:32 AM, <pharmwaste-request at lists.dep.state.fl.us>
wrote:

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> Today's Topics:
>
>    1. FW: [Pharmwaste] Septic Systems Contaminate Drinking Water
>       Wells on  Cape Cod article (Tenace, Laurie)
>    2. Contaminated Drinking Water on Cape Cod (Ed Gottlieb)
>
>
> ---------- Forwarded message ----------
> From: "Tenace, Laurie" <Laurie.Tenace at dep.state.fl.us>
> To: "'pharmwaste at lists.dep.state.fl.us'" <pharmwaste at lists.dep.state.fl.us
> >
> Cc:
> Date: Tue, 9 Feb 2016 13:08:55 +0000
> Subject: FW: [Pharmwaste] Septic Systems Contaminate Drinking Water Wells
> on Cape Cod article
>
> Please note this email did not originate with me. I know some people are
> having problems posting to the list serve. I am working on a fix but for
> the meantime, if you try to post something unsuccessfully, please forward
> it to me and I’ll post it for you.
>
>
>
> Please also realize that the list serve is just a small part of my job and
> sometimes the list serve has to wait. If I am out of the office, no one
> else is responding to it for me.
>
>
>
> Still, we’re lucky to have this great way to communicate about these
> issues –
>
> Thanks,
>
> Laurie
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> *From:* John Anderson [mailto:JcAnderson27 at outlook.com
> <JcAnderson27 at outlook.com>]
> *Sent:* Monday, February 01, 2016 11:40 AM
> *To:* 'Tenace, Laurie'; 'pharmwaste at lists.dep.state.fl.us'
> *Subject:* RE: [Pharmwaste] Septic Systems Contaminate Drinking Water
> Wells on Cape Cod article
>
>
>
> Laurie,
>
>
>
> Great post!
>
>
>
> It is terrific to hear about anomalies on Cape Cod reverberating from the
> West Coast and Seattle!
>
>
>
> A couple of points not mentioned:
>
>
>
> ·         Cape Cod is essentially a giant sand bar with ground water.  It
> stays fixed in its location thanks to the Army Corps of Engineers and
> battles fought by each town.
>
> ·         The aquifer is very high, therefore on Cape Cod, Groundwater =
> Surface Water
>
> ·         Similar concerns exist for the islands Nantucket, Martha’s
> Vineyard and Jamestown in harbor of Newport RI
>
> ·         Sadly in some areas on Cape Cod, where there actually is town
> sewage, the towns often inject into the ground.  (I understand there may be
> some pre-treatment, but pre-treatment for what?)
>
>
>
> One evening in Cambridge, MA at an event sponsored by MIT, where
> Pharma-Cycle was one of the featured companies presenting, one serial
> entrepreneur out of MIT lingered by our table.  The man was obviously
> thinking about some things he usually did not focus upon ion life.  In
> chatting with him I mentioned my septic in Boxford, MA was on the backyard
> behind my lawn and the well-head was on the front lawn.  Additionally my
> well in Boxford is 300 feet deep with a lot of solid New England ledge in
> between the two systems.  However, I told him that while shopping for
> houses I was laughed at as I had wells tested, sometimes with shocking
> results … even in geologies assumed to be similar to Boxford’s.
>
>
>
> To my utter amazement, this very precise individual insisted his well at
> his summer home on either Nantucket or Martha’s Vineyard (I cannot recall
> which) was only 9 feet deep!!!  He absolutely insisted 9 feet was the exact
> depth.  I would like to think he was terribly mistaken … but he knew all
> sorts of other details regarding a broad range of subjects … so maybe that
> evening he discovered a huge oversight and family health risk!  I remember
> suggesting Poland Springs Water!
>
>
>
> I am hoping Jim Mullowney, who has brought some resources to bear on these
> questions and caused studies to be performed on Cape Cod, will follow-up
> this post with some temperate and thoughtful posts showing the Cancer Fish
> from Cape Cod, etc.
>
>
>
> Thanks again for this very enlightening post showing some of the issues
> highlighted on Cape Cod are being heard nationally!
>
>
>
> Best Regards!
>
>
>
> John Anderson
>
>
>
> jcanderson at HUBCFO.com
>
> 617-499-6900     Office
>
> 617-499-6900     Fax
>
> 978-837-0092     Mobile
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> *From:* pharmwaste-bounces at lists.dep.state.fl.us [
> mailto:pharmwaste-bounces at lists.dep.state.fl.us
> <pharmwaste-bounces at lists.dep.state.fl.us>] *On Behalf Of *Tenace, Laurie
> *Sent:* Friday, January 29, 2016 9:16 AM
> *To:* 'pharmwaste at lists.dep.state.fl.us'
> *Subject:* [Pharmwaste] Septic Systems Contaminate Drinking Water Wells
> on Cape Cod article
>
>
>
>
> http://www.circleofblue.org/waternews/2016/world/septic-systems-contaminate-drinking-water-wells-on-cape-cod/
>
>
>
> Cape Cod, the hooked arm of land that flexes eastward from mainland
> Massachusetts, is the iconic New England vacation spot. Less glamorously,
> it is also the perfect laboratory to study the relationship between
> wastewater and groundwater contamination.
>
> The peninsula, whose population of 215,000 more than doubles during the
> summer, has tight clusters of septic systems and shallow household drinking
> water wells. Both are placed, on the same parcel of land, in sand and
> gravel soils through which water easily flows. Combined, it is a recipe for
> contamination. That is exactly what researchers at the Silent Spring
> Institute have found.
>
> They tested 20 household drinking water wells for 117 organic compounds in
> an area that uses exclusively septic systems or cesspools, which are
> backyard means of disposing toilet waste and water that goes down drains.
> The organic compounds are pharmaceuticals, personal care products,
> sweeteners, and certain chemicals used to stop fire. In the well water, the
> researchers detected 27 of the compounds, some of which have been found to
> interfere with hormonal development and reproduction in fish species.
> Health guidelines exist for only 10 of the compounds they detected.
>
> The study was published on January 27 online in the journal *Science of
> the Total Environment
> <http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0048969715312353>*.
>
> “Septic systems were not designed to remove these contaminants,” Laurel
> Schaider, a research scientist and lead author of the study, told Circle of
> Blue. “In dense areas, many people are downstream of someone else’s septic
> system.”
>
> A 2014 study
> <http://www.silentspring.org/resource/pharmaceuticals-perfluorosurfactants-and-other-organic-wastewater-compounds-public-drinking>
> from Silent Spring found similar contaminants in wells used by public
> drinking water systems.
>
> Household drinking water wells are particularly vulnerable to septic
> system pollution
> <http://www.circleofblue.org/waternews/2015/world/americas-spreading-septic-threat/>.
> Well owners, unlike operators of public drinking water systems, are not
> required to test their water for contaminants. Household wells serve 14
> percent of the U.S. population, more than 44 million people.
> Finding the Medicine Cabinet in Groundwater
>
> There is a well-established connection
> <http://www.circleofblue.org/waternews/2015/world/septic-system-pollution-contributes-to-disease-outbreaks/>
> between septic systems and nitrate and bacterial pollution in drinking
> water wells. This causes problems. Two-thirds of disease outbreaks
> <http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/gwat.12121/abstract;jsessionid=9B4AA8F1A20F27E5E8B40D72290077B8.f02t04>
> in the United States due to untreated groundwater in the last four decades
> were linked to septic systems or a poorly designed well, according to the
> Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
>
> Schaider and her colleagues, however, were looking for a different type of
> contaminant on Cape Cod. Pharmaceuticals, flame retardants, and other
> similar compounds are known as “emerging” contaminants because their health
> effects are only beginning to be studied and few have federal drinking
> water standards .
>
> Schaider was careful to note that the concentrations they detected — none
> of which exceeded health guidelines — were tiny, in the parts-per-billion
> range, which is thousands or millions of times lower than a medical dose.
> Even so, the cumulative, long-term effect of drin king water with low
> pharmaceutical concentrations, especially for children or pregnant women,
> is poorly understood.
>
> “There are health concerns about the interaction of different chemicals in
> the body,” Schaider said.
> Remedies
>
> What is a town or a homeowner to do? More than eight out of 10 homes on
> Cape Cod uses a septic system or cesspool and one in five uses a household
> well.
>
> Gathering more information about well water quality is one recommendation.
> That information, however, is expensive. Schaider said that analyzing one
> water sample for the 117 contaminants in her study cost $US 1,800.
>
> “It’s not routine testing that everyone can do,” she said.
>
> The researchers looked for a shortcut that might help homeowners. They
> analyzed the relationship between different contaminants, to see if the
> presence of one could indicate the presence of others. Nitrate, which is
> not removed by traditional septic systems, was a suitable though imperfect
> match — imperfect because agriculture runoff is also a large source of
> nitrate pollution. Testing for nitrate is much cheaper, roughly $US 20 per
> sample.
>
> Other recommendations involve more effort. Local ordinances that require a
> certain distance between septic systems and household wells could be
> revised, Schaider said. Or, instead of continuing to build individual
> wells, new developments could drill a community well to supply many homes.
> The well would be strategically located away from septic system runoff.
>
> That option, of course, does nothing to address the root cause of the
> pollution, which is the septic system itself. Some communities on Cape Cod
> are experimenting with new treatment techniques
> <http://www.circleofblue.org/waternews/2015/world/americas-septic-system-failures-can-be-fixed/>,
> but more will be needed. Roughly one in five U.S. households uses a septic
> system.
>
>
>
>
>
> Laurie Tenace
>
> Environmental Specialist
>
> Waste Reduction Section
>
> Florida Department of Environmental Protection
>
> 2600 Blair Stone Road, MS4555
>
> Tallahassee, FL  32399
>
> Laurie.Tenace at dep.state.fl.us
>
> 850.245.8759
>
>
>
>
> ---------- Forwarded message ----------
> From: Ed Gottlieb <EGottlieb at cityofithaca.org>
> To: "'pharmwaste at lists.dep.state.fl.us'" <pharmwaste at lists.dep.state.fl.us
> >
> Cc:
> Date: Tue, 9 Feb 2016 14:32:10 +0000
> Subject: [Pharmwaste] Contaminated Drinking Water on Cape Cod
> Cape Cod has a long history of ground and drinking water contamination
> issues.
> To prevent salt water intrusion into the sand aquifer, wastewater is
> typically injected rather than discharged.
>
> Otis Air Base is a superfund site.  There are ten separate pollution
> plumes that are undergoing extraction and treatment, with a combined pump
> rate of 10.7 MGD.
> http://cumulis.epa.gov/supercpad/cursites/csitinfo.cfm?id=0100960
> The use of phosphate detergents over a limited number of years now shows
> up as an uneven ring, spreading with the flow of groundwater.  Another
> plume is TCE, which was used to clean fighter planes for many years.
>
> Another drinking water problem on the Cape stemmed from the use of
> concrete water pipes that were reinforced with asbestos fibers.  At some
> point it was realized that asbestos fibers in drinking water posed a health
> risk.  To abate the asbestos, the pipes were coated with vinyl.  Ever
> since, the TCE that carried the vinyl has been leaching into the drinking
> water.
> http://www.mass.gov/eea/docs/dep/water/drinking/alpha/i-thru-z/vlac1982.pdf
>
> WARNING: Rant below!
>
> It seems to me that technological fixes to technological problems often
> turn out to cause problems of their own, sometimes worse then the
> original.  A recent example is "BPA free" plastics.
>
> http://www.motherjones.com/environment/2014/03/tritan-certichem-eastman-bpa-free-plastic-safe
> And, what do we know of about the health effects of the new generation of
> fire retardant chemicals?
>
> Ed Gottlieb
> Chair, Coalition for Safe Medication Disposal
> Industrial Pretreatment Coordinator
> Ithaca Area Wastewater Treatment Facility
> 525 3rd Street
> Ithaca, NY  14850
> (607) 273-8381
> fax: (607) 273-8433
> ------------------------------
> *From:* pharmwaste-bounces at lists.dep.state.fl.us [
> pharmwaste-bounces at lists.dep.state.fl.us] on behalf of Tenace, Laurie [
> Laurie.Tenace at dep.state.fl.us]
> *Sent:* Tuesday, February 09, 2016 8:08 AM
> *To:* 'pharmwaste at lists.dep.state.fl.us'
> *Subject:* FW: [Pharmwaste] Septic Systems Contaminate Drinking Water
> Wells on Cape Cod article
>
> Please note this email did not originate with me. I know some people are
> having problems posting to the list serve. I am working on a fix but for
> the meantime, if you try to post something unsuccessfully, please forward
> it to me and I’ll post it for you.
>
>
>
> Please also realize that the list serve is just a small part of my job and
> sometimes the list serve has to wait. If I am out of the office, no one
> else is responding to it for me.
>
>
>
> Still, we’re lucky to have this great way to communicate about these
> issues –
>
> Thanks,
>
> Laurie
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> *From:* John Anderson [mailto:JcAnderson27 at outlook.com
> <JcAnderson27 at outlook.com>]
> *Sent:* Monday, February 01, 2016 11:40 AM
> *To:* 'Tenace, Laurie'; 'pharmwaste at lists.dep.state.fl.us'
> *Subject:* RE: [Pharmwaste] Septic Systems Contaminate Drinking Water
> Wells on Cape Cod article
>
>
>
> Laurie,
>
>
>
> Great post!
>
>
>
> It is terrific to hear about anomalies on Cape Cod reverberating from the
> West Coast and Seattle!
>
>
>
> A couple of points not mentioned:
>
>
>
> ·         Cape Cod is essentially a giant sand bar with ground water.  It
> stays fixed in its location thanks to the Army Corps of Engineers and
> battles fought by each town.
>
> ·         The aquifer is very high, therefore on Cape Cod, Groundwater =
> Surface Water
>
> ·         Similar concerns exist for the islands Nantucket, Martha’s
> Vineyard and Jamestown in harbor of Newport RI
>
> ·         Sadly in some areas on Cape Cod, where there actually is town
> sewage, the towns often inject into the ground.  (I understand there may be
> some pre-treatment, but pre-treatment for what?)
>
>
>
> One evening in Cambridge, MA at an event sponsored by MIT, where
> Pharma-Cycle was one of the featured companies presenting, one serial
> entrepreneur out of MIT lingered by our table.  The man was obviously
> thinking about some things he usually did not focus upon ion life.  In
> chatting with him I mentioned my septic in Boxford, MA was on the backyard
> behind my lawn and the well-head was on the front lawn.  Additionally my
> well in Boxford is 300 feet deep with a lot of solid New England ledge in
> between the two systems.  However, I told him that while shopping for
> houses I was laughed at as I had wells tested, sometimes with shocking
> results … even in geologies assumed to be similar to Boxford’s.
>
>
>
> To my utter amazement, this very precise individual insisted his well at
> his summer home on either Nantucket or Martha’s Vineyard (I cannot recall
> which) was only 9 feet deep!!!  He absolutely insisted 9 feet was the exact
> depth.  I would like to think he was terribly mistaken … but he knew all
> sorts of other details regarding a broad range of subjects … so maybe that
> evening he discovered a huge oversight and family health risk!  I remember
> suggesting Poland Springs Water!
>
>
>
> I am hoping Jim Mullowney, who has brought some resources to bear on these
> questions and caused studies to be performed on Cape Cod, will follow-up
> this post with some temperate and thoughtful posts showing the Cancer Fish
> from Cape Cod, etc.
>
>
>
> Thanks again for this very enlightening post showing some of the issues
> highlighted on Cape Cod are being heard nationally!
>
>
>
> Best Regards!
>
>
>
> John Anderson
>
>
>
> jcanderson at HUBCFO.com
>
> 617-499-6900     Office
>
> 617-499-6900     Fax
>
> 978-837-0092     Mobile
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> *From:* pharmwaste-bounces at lists.dep.state.fl.us [
> mailto:pharmwaste-bounces at lists.dep.state.fl.us
> <pharmwaste-bounces at lists.dep.state.fl.us>] *On Behalf Of *Tenace, Laurie
> *Sent:* Friday, January 29, 2016 9:16 AM
> *To:* 'pharmwaste at lists.dep.state.fl.us'
> *Subject:* [Pharmwaste] Septic Systems Contaminate Drinking Water Wells
> on Cape Cod article
>
>
>
>
> http://www.circleofblue.org/waternews/2016/world/septic-systems-contaminate-drinking-water-wells-on-cape-cod/
>
>
>
> Cape Cod, the hooked arm of land that flexes eastward from mainland
> Massachusetts, is the iconic New England vacation spot. Less glamorously,
> it is also the perfect laboratory to study the relationship between
> wastewater and groundwater contamination.
>
> The peninsula, whose population of 215,000 more than doubles during the
> summer, has tight clusters of septic systems and shallow household drinking
> water wells. Both are placed, on the same parcel of land, in sand and
> gravel soils through which water easily flows. Combined, it is a recipe for
> contamination. That is exactly what researchers at the Silent Spring
> Institute have found.
>
> They tested 20 household drinking water wells for 117 organic compounds in
> an area that uses exclusively septic systems or cesspools, which are
> backyard means of disposing toilet waste and water that goes down drains.
> The organic compounds are pharmaceuticals, personal care products,
> sweeteners, and certain chemicals used to stop fire. In the well water, the
> researchers detected 27 of the compounds, some of which have been found to
> interfere with hormonal development and reproduction in fish species.
> Health guidelines exist for only 10 of the compounds they detected.
>
> The study was published on January 27 online in the journal *Science of
> the Total Environment
> <http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0048969715312353>*.
>
> “Septic systems were not designed to remove these contaminants,” Laurel
> Schaider, a research scientist and lead author of the study, told Circle of
> Blue. “In dense areas, many people are downstream of someone else’s septic
> system.”
>
> A 2014 study
> <http://www.silentspring.org/resource/pharmaceuticals-perfluorosurfactants-and-other-organic-wastewater-compounds-public-drinking>
> from Silent Spring found similar contaminants in wells used by public
> drinking water systems.
>
> Household drinking water wells are particularly vulnerable to septic
> system pollution
> <http://www.circleofblue.org/waternews/2015/world/americas-spreading-septic-threat/>.
> Well owners, unlike operators of public drinking water systems, are not
> required to test their water for contaminants. Household wells serve 14
> percent of the U.S. population, more than 44 million people.
> Finding the Medicine Cabinet in Groundwater
>
> There is a well-established connection
> <http://www.circleofblue.org/waternews/2015/world/septic-system-pollution-contributes-to-disease-outbreaks/>
> between septic systems and nitrate and bacterial pollution in drinking
> water wells. This causes problems. Two-thirds of disease outbreaks
> <http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/gwat.12121/abstract;jsessionid=9B4AA8F1A20F27E5E8B40D72290077B8.f02t04>
> in the United States due to untreated groundwater in the last four decades
> were linked to septic systems or a poorly designed well, according to the
> Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
>
> Schaider and her colleagues, however, were looking for a different type of
> contaminant on Cape Cod. Pharmaceuticals, flame retardants, and other
> similar compounds are known as “emerging” contaminants because their health
> effects are only beginning to be studied and few have federal drinking
> water standards .
>
> Schaider was careful to note that the concentrations they detected — none
> of which exceeded health guidelines — were tiny, in the parts-per-billion
> range, which is thousands or millions of times lower than a medical dose.
> Even so, the cumulative, long-term effect of drin king water with low
> pharmaceutical concentrations, especially for children or pregnant women,
> is poorly understood.
>
> “There are health concerns about the interaction of different chemicals in
> the body,” Schaider said.
> Remedies
>
> What is a town or a homeowner to do? More than eight out of 10 homes on
> Cape Cod uses a septic system or cesspool and one in five uses a household
> well.
>
> Gathering more information about well water quality is one recommendation.
> That information, however, is expensive. Schaider said that analyzing one
> water sample for the 117 contaminants in her study cost $US 1,800.
>
> “It’s not routine testing that everyone can do,” she said.
>
> The researchers looked for a shortcut that might help homeowners. They
> analyzed the relationship between different contaminants, to see if the
> presence of one could indicate the presence of others. Nitrate, which is
> not removed by traditional septic systems, was a suitable though imperfect
> match — imperfect because agriculture runoff is also a large source of
> nitrate pollution. Testing for nitrate is much cheaper, roughly $US 20 per
> sample.
>
> Other recommendations involve more effort. Local ordinances that require a
> certain distance between septic systems and household wells could be
> revised, Schaider said. Or, instead of continuing to build individual
> wells, new developments could drill a community well to supply many homes.
> The well would be strategically located away from septic system runoff.
>
> That option, of course, does nothing to address the root cause of the
> pollution, which is the septic system itself. Some communities on Cape Cod
> are experimenting with new treatment techniques
> <http://www.circleofblue.org/waternews/2015/world/americas-septic-system-failures-can-be-fixed/>,
> but more will be needed. Roughly one in five U.S. households uses a septic
> system.
>
>
>
>
>
> Laurie Tenace
>
> Environmental Specialist
>
> Waste Reduction Section
>
> Florida Department of Environmental Protection
>
> 2600 Blair Stone Road, MS4555
>
> Tallahassee, FL  32399
>
> Laurie.Tenace at dep.state.fl.us
>
> 850.245.8759
>
>
>
> ---
> Note: As a courtesy to other listserv subscribers, please post messages to
> the listserv in plain text format to avoid the garbling of messages
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