Illinois State Water Survey

blog posts

• The Cost of Unregulated Pollution

  Apr 18, 2014 4:15 pm28 views

  An op-ed piece published in the New York Times on April 6, 2014, is pretty sobering. Its title is “China’s Poisonous Waterways”, and in it the author describes the massive amount of industrial and agricultural pollution that has contaminated the river that runs through his childhood village since he left. There seems to be an undue amount of sickness and early death in the village, which he attributes to the poisonous river. His old village is one of more than 200 “cancer villages” in China with extraordinary cancer rates. 

• 

  Large Study of Bacterial Water Quality in Sub-Saharan Africa

  Nov 17, 2016 10:45 am29 views

  A just released study did a meta-analysis of almost 43,000 water samples from 7 countries in sub-Saharan Africa to assess the amount of bacterial contamination and how it varied with respect to source type.

• More News on Antibiotic Resistance

  May 13, 2015 10:45 am32 views

  I recently read a couple of articles on the development of antibiotic resistance of water-borne pathogenic bacteria, an unsettling reality in the modern world. One article was about antibiotic resistance in China’s waterways primarily due to practices in the pork industry. The other article was about a typhoid epidemic in Africa being traced to drug-resistant bacteria.

• Video on Flint Water Crisis

  Mar 11, 2016 3:15 pm37 views

  The New Yorker tweeted a 5-minute video of residents of Flint talking about how the water crisis has affected them, and how they’ve lost trust in the system. One of the worst things about the whole debacle is the loss of trust in this basic service of delivering healthy water to our citizens.

• Petroleum Spills Can Increase Arsenic Leaching

  Jan 30, 2015 4:15 pm38 views

  One of the most widespread contaminants of groundwater in Illinois, and the world, is arsenic. Most of the contamination is naturally occurring, but there are many potential human sources, including mining, fossil fuel combustion, pesticides, and wood preservation. A new study suggests a combination of human and natural contamination, where human activities may increase the release of naturally occurring arsenic.

• Water Management Issues in the Chicago Region

  Jun 24, 2013 3:15 pm40 views

  This is not strictly a water quality issue, but Marcella Bondie of the Metropolitan Planning Commission in Chicago recently posted a blog post about water management issues in the Chicago region. Its title is “Water, Water Everywhere? DuPage Water Commission leads efforts to better manage Lake Michigan water”, and it’s a good summary.

• Update on European Regulation of Estrogens

  Dec 7, 2012 9:30 am43 views

  In a post last May, I wrote about the European Commission’s intent to regulate the synthetic estrogen compound ethinyl estradiol (EE2) under the Water Framework Directive. According to a recent article in Nature, those regulations will be not approved by the European Parliament. Intense lobbying by the water and pharmaceutical industries has apparently convinced the European Union member states that the financial costs are too much.

• Creating Energy while Cleaning Water

  Sep 18, 2013 4:15 pm50 views

  Here’s an interesting news article involving water quality. Engineers from Stanford are developing techniques to harness electricity from microbes as they work to clean human sewage. Basically, by inserting positive and negative electrodes into wasterwater, the researchers “fish for electrons”. During reactions that degrade organic molecules, microbes cluster around the negative electrode and produce electrons, which are then captured by the positive electrode.

• 

  Animas River Spill Follow-Up

  Dec 22, 2016 3:45 pm51 views

  The first peer-reviewed paper (as far as I can tell) related to the Animas River, Colorado, was recently published. An estimated 3 million gallons of toxic acid mine drainage water was released into a small tributary of the Animas River due to the failure of a dam containing the waste.

• Bag It Redux: Plastics in the Environment

  Oct 23, 2012 4:45 pm53 views

  The movie "Bag It: Is your life too plastic?", which was shown at the Art Theater in Champaign last fall and which I reviewed, is again being shown in town. It will be at the Illinois Sustainable Technology Center (ISTC), 1 E. Hazelwood Drive, Champaign, on Thursday October 25, at 7:00 PM. It's located just west of the Research Park. Dr. B.K. Sharma, a senior chemist at the ISTC who is doing research on converting plastic bags into oil to potentially be used as fuel or lubricants, will give a 15 minute presentation before the film. Go!

   

• A Change in Focus: More Groundwater

  Aug 17, 2017 9:45 am55 views

  Due to various circumstances, I have been unable to maintain a reasonable schedule for blog posts on my blog "Water Quality, Focus on Illinois." In fact, I haven't posted in a number of months. As a result, we are expanding the blogs to include multiple authors in the Groundwater Science Section at the Illinois State Water Survey, Prairie Research Institute at the University of Illinois. The scope of the blog posts will be broadened to include many topics on groundwater, not just water quality, still with an emphasis on Illinois, although not limited to our state. We hope you enjoy the new look, and we look forward to your feedback.

• Drug Resistance in River Water

  Dec 19, 2012 3:15 pm57 views

  A paper just published in the journal Environmental Science & Technology (Chen et al. 2012, A Survey of Drug Resistance bla Genes Originating from Synthetic Plasmid Vectors in Six Chinese Rivers, vol. 46, pp. 13448−13454) reports on the detection of environmental microbes with antibiotic resistance genes in six rivers in China. Researchers have known for some time about drug-resistant bacteria in hospitals and nursing homes, where the large use of antibiotics has allowed such “superbugs” to proliferate. Infections caused by these drug-resistant bacteria can have very high death rates. In recent years, scientists have discovered that antibiotic resistance genes have been finding their way into the natural environment.

• Compound in Fracking Fluid Found in Domestic Well

  May 5, 2015 3:00 pm65 views

  In a paper just published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, it’s been reported that an organic compound used in gas-drilling fluids, 2-n-Butoxyethanol (C4H9OC2H4OH), was detected in a domestic well in Pennsylvania. This was a bit of a surprise, because actually the hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, occurs thousands of feet beneath the aquifer. It appears the contamination is the result of poor practices at the surface, either drilling fluid escaping during the initial drilling of the well, or a leaky drilling waste pit.

• Disinfectant Byproducts

  Jul 12, 2013 3:00 pm66 views

  A friend recently showed me a newsletter he receives from a company that sells vitamins and dietary supplements; an article in it warned that disinfectant byproducts in public drinking water are a serious health risk. The author referred to a paper published by researchers at the University of Illinois that shows some of these compounds kill cells and cause DNA damage (Pals, J.A., et al., 2011. Biological mechanism for the toxicity of haloacetic acid drinking water disinfection byproducts. Environmental Science & Technology 45:5791–5797). The author then states that unless you have a deep private well that you can test and trust, you should consider buying a distillation system. While disinfection byproducts are no joke and are regulated by the Environmental Protection Agency, I think the author overstates the problem and its solution.

• 

  RIP Ruth Patrick

  Sep 27, 2013 9:15 am66 views

  I don't remember ever hearing of Ruth Patrick before I read her obituary the other day, but I wish I had known her. She was one of the earliest researchers in water quality, studying diatoms in lakes, and revealing the importance of biodiversity. The idea that biological diversity reflects environmental stresses even bears her name, the “Patrick Principle.” She worked when being a woman scientist and an environmentalist were both rare and sometimes suspect, starting her career in the 1930s. I should really know her name, since one of her publications was “Groundwater Contamination in the United States”, published in 1987. RIP, Dr. Patrick.

• Drinking Our Own Pee

  Jun 17, 2014 3:00 pm71 views

  Here’s a great article on Slate.com about drinking “recycled” water.

• 

  More on Fracking and Groundwater Quality

  Nov 26, 2014 2:00 pm71 views

  Another study, this one by the USGS in North Dakota, suggests fracking has not degraded water quality in an overlying aquifer.

• 

  Climate Change and Water Quality

  Jul 20, 2016 4:00 pm77 views

  Groundwater is generally shielded from variations in the weather, and changes in groundwater quality due to changes in temperature and precipitation are likely to be muted and subtle. However, surface water quality is a different story, and a recent article in Nature discusses this.

• Teflon Regulations

  Sep 4, 2015 3:45 pm89 views

  My brilliant daughter (I have two) recently sent me a link to a disturbing story. It has to do with surface water and groundwater contamination in Parkersburg, WV, by DuPont. The offending compound was perfluorooctanoic acid, also known as C8, which is a key ingredient in Teflon and many other products.

• Pledge to Test Your Well Water: Win a FREE Water Test

  Feb 6, 2018 4:30 pm91 views

  

  The Private Well Class is celebrating National Groundwater Awareness Week (#GWAW2018) by hosting the 3rd annual Pledge to Test (#pledge2test) Campaign. In this nationwide pledge, well owners are invited to pledge to submit a water sample for testing to a lab in their area. One Pledge to Test Campaign participant will be randomly selected to be reimbursed for the cost of testing the private well water at their residence, up to $200.

• 

  Microplastics

  Jul 11, 2014 3:00 pm91 views

  An interesting, and somewhat concerning, article in the latest issue of Science, on microplastics in the oceanic environment (“Microplastics in the seas,” by Kara Lavender Law and Richard C. Thompson. Science 345(6193):144-145. DOI: 10.1126/science.1254065). Microplastics refers to plastic debris smaller than 5 mm in diameter, and there’s a lot of it in the ocean. How harmful it is to ocean biota is unknown, but there are reasons for concern. Cleaning them up would be an impossible task. Once again, our best policy would be to figure out how to limit them from entering the environment in the first place.

• Antibiotics and Livestock

  Sep 14, 2012 3:00 pm97 views

  An article in last week’s Science section of the New York Times (September 4, 2012) reported on the rise of antibiotic resistance in bacteria associated with livestock. I knew that a large percentage of antibiotics used in the U.S. went to livestock, but I didn’t realize it was 80 percent, as the Times article reports. There are no reporting requirements for the use of antibiotics in animals, so there is a serious lack of data on what’s happening in the environment as a result of this large-scale dosing of animals.

• Contaminant Spill of the Day

  Jan 10, 2014 3:45 pm109 views

  There was a major contamination event in West Virginia yesterday, causing the governor to issue a state of emergency. A large amount of 4-methylcyclohexane methanol, a coal preparation foaming agent, leaked in the Elk River just outside of Charleston. The size of the spill hasn’t been reported yet. About 300,000 people have been warned not to use tap water for drinking, cooking, or bathing, and a number of businesses and schools have closed as a result.

• Regulating pharmaceuticals

  Jun 8, 2012 10:15 am112 views

  In a recent article published in Nature titled “The hidden costs of flexible fertility”, Richard Owen and Susan Jobling report that the European Commission recently announced that it intends to regulate the synthetic estrogen compound ethinyl estradiol (EE2) under the Water Framework Directive. With more than 100 million women worldwide using contraceptive pills, a lot of synthetic estrogen is entering the environment, causing negative effects to aquatic species, such as changing the sex of fish.

• 

  4,000 Year-Old Pollution

  Oct 12, 2017 11:45 am125 views

  We've been polluting for a long time.

• 

  Arsenic in Vietnamese Groundwater

  Sep 25, 2013 4:00 pm133 views

  It’s not every day someone I know is quoted in the New York Times. In yesterday’s (Sept. 24, 2013) ScienceTimes section (p. D5), there was an article highlighting work by Lex van Geen, a geochemist at Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory at Columbia University. Lex contacted the Water Survey a couple of years ago about some potential collaboration on arsenic in groundwater in central Illinois, a subject we have studied in some detail. In fact, we just received news that a National Science Foundation proposal that one of our staff (Tom Holm) is co-PI on with Lex has been funded. The research will use a new sampling technique (“freeze shoe”) to collect intact cores of aquifer material, and initial work will probably be done in Tazewell County.

• Arsenic in Drinking Water Can Affect Children’s IQ

  Aug 22, 2014 9:45 am134 views

  A recent paper suggests that children exposed to elevated levels of arsenic in their drinking water experienced declines in intelligence [G.A. Wasserman et al., 2014. A cross-sectional study of well water arsenic and child IQ in Maine schoolchildren. Environmental Health 13:23  doi:10.1186/1476-069X-13-23]. Previous studies reported similar results in South Asia and Bangladesh, but this is the first study showing problems in the U.S. Most disturbing to me was that the arsenic concentration threshold above which effects were seen was so low, only 5 µg/L (5 ppb), or half of the drinking water standard in the U.S. and Europe (10 µg/L). The researchers state that the effects on IQ are similar to those found for children with elevated levels of lead in their blood.

• "Tapped"

  Apr 10, 2015 10:30 am136 views

  The Land Conservation Foundation Program in Law and Philosophy at the University of Illinois screened the movie “Tapped” in Champaign the other night and asked me to make a few comments after the film ended. “Tapped” was released in 2008 as an exposé of the bottled water industry. I’ve blogged about bottled water in the past, so I got the gig.

• 

  Ongoing Water Supply Planning in Middle Illinois

  Mar 27, 2018 2:15 pm150 views

  Water Supply Planning is a cyclical effort to perform long-term water supply analyses for each of the planning regions throughout Illinois and identify potential risks to water supply using the latest available data. Here we present some early results for the Middle Illinois region, with work slated to wrap up over the next few months.

• 

  Neonicotinoids in U.S. Streams

  Aug 20, 2015 4:15 pm152 views

  As you might guess from their name, neonicotinoids are chemically similar to nicotine and, sort of ironically, are especially effective against sucking insects. The most controversial aspect of neonicotinoids is that they have been linked to honey bee colony collapse.

• Brackish Groundwater: A Potential Source for Drinking Water

  Jul 31, 2015 2:15 pm155 views

  A recent article discussed the potential for desalinating brackish groundwater as a potential source of drinking water, specifically in Texas. West Texas is dry and has limited fresh groundwater resources, so it may make economic sense in areas like that.

• 

  Fish Adapting to Pollution

  Dec 22, 2016 4:15 pm155 views

  A paper published in Science reports that genetic adaptions in the Atlantic killifish (Fundulus heteroclitus) allow it to survive what, in unpolluted environments, would be lethal levels of bioaccumulative dioxin-like contaminants.

• More thoughts on estrogens in the environment

  Jun 29, 2012 9:15 am156 views

  In my last post I mentioned how the European Commission intends to regulate the synthetic estrogen compound ethinyl estradiol (EE2), which has been discovered to cause ecological damage to aquatic species. The Atlantic magazine recently published their annual “Ideas Issue,” and one of their big ideas was to allow the pill to be sold over the counter.

• 

  Triclosan and Microbiomes

  Jul 22, 2016 4:45 pm157 views

  Triclosan is a very common antibacterial compound, used in antibacterial soaps and toothpaste, and it is found in humans (detected in about 75% of urine samples in the U.S. in 2008) and in the aquatic environment. 

• Water Quality and the Super Bowl

  Jan 26, 2012 4:30 pm163 views

  You may have heard that on Super Bowl Sunday, America's biggest secular holiday, wastewater systems throughout the country are put under almost unbearable pressure due to everyone going to the bathroom at halftime and flusing their toilets at the same time. Well, turns out this a fairly persistent urban myth. But some researchers have wondered if the Super Bowl may be having a different effect on our wastewater systems. Namely, does illicit drug use spike during the game, and if so, can we find proof in the wastewater?

   

• Visit the ISWS at the 2018 Illinois State Fair!

  Jul 13, 2018 10:15 am165 views

  The Illinois State Water Survey will be participating in the 2018 Illinois State Fair in Springfield, IL with a booth shared by the Private Land Programs Tent in Conservation World, which will be open daily from Friday, August 10th to Sunday, August 19th from 10 a.m. to 7 p.m.

• Five Myths About Water

  Apr 10, 2012 9:30 am166 views

  A recent op-ed at the Washington Post website by Charles Fishman, author of “The Big Thirst: The Secret Life and Turbulent Future of Water,” discusses five prevalent myths about water: (1) We’re running out of water; (2) Bottled water is better than tap water; (3) The 21^st century will be a century of water wars; (4) America is using more water all the time; and (5) You need to drink eight glasses a day.

• Successful Private Well Owner Outreach for the Water Survey at the 2018 Illinois State Fair

  Sep 4, 2018 5:15 pm166 views

  Hundreds of children and adults were educated by Illinois State Water Survey staff about groundwater and wells at the 2018 Illinois State Fair in Springfield. Staff from the Groundwater Science Section shared space in the Private Lands Programs tent for 10 days in Conservation World. This was the first presence by ISWS at the State Fair in more than a decade.

• 

  Micro- and Nanoparticles

  Nov 3, 2016 9:00 am176 views

  There are both natural and engineered micro- and nanomaterials in our world. Ocean spray, smoke, and milk all contain natural nanomaterials. In recent years, engineered materials have been designed and produced with many useful applications.

• "Bag It", the movie: Plastics in the Environment

  Aug 31, 2011 5:45 pm179 views

  The award winning documentary Bag It will be shown at the Art Theater in downtown Champaign on Tuesday, September 20, 2011, at 7 PM. I have seen the film and highly recommend it. It starts out as a critical look at plastic bags, but ends up being a much broader examination of the effects of plastic on the environment and human society.

• Banning Bisphenol-A from Food Containers?

  Mar 30, 2012 2:45 pm183 views

  Last August I wrote a post about bisphenol-A (BPA), an Endocrine Disrupting Chemical (EDC), which can mess with human and animal hormonal processes. Today on National Public Radio’s Morning Edition, there was a report that the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) was about to decide whether to ban BPA from food packaging.

   

• Groundwater: Possible Long-Term Source of Nitrate to Streams

  Jun 6, 2013 9:15 am183 views

  We’ve known for a long time that too much nitrogen in streams, lakes, and seas can be a bad thing, and many efforts are being made to reduce the amount of nitrogen (primarily nitrate) coming off of agricultural fields. In addition to being smarter about when and how much fertilizer is applied, a number of techniques designed to slow down movement of runoff to streams, such as constructing wetlands or water-table management, are being tested. Decreasing the concentrations and loads of nitrate in streams in agricultural regions has been remarkably difficult, however, and oftentimes do not match expectations based on these new best management practices (BMPs). A recent study by USGS scientists suggests that the long times it takes for groundwater to discharge to streams is the most likely factor.

• 

  Restricting Antibiotics Use for Livestock

  Dec 12, 2013 2:00 pm184 views

  It’s not that common to have important environmental news on the front page of The New York Times, but today is such a day. The Food and Drug Administration yesterday (December 12, 2013) announced a major new policy to phase out the “indiscriminate use” of antibiotics for livestock raised for meat. This is really important, and really good, news for the environment and human health.

• 

  ISWS Reignites Outreach Activities in Illinois

  Jun 1, 2018 1:45 pm188 views

  The Illinois State Water Survey’s Groundwater Section has begun taking a more active role in outreach to help the residents and youth in Illinois learn more about groundwater and private wells. The ISWS has been working with Illinois citizens and important stakeholders for more than a century to raise awareness about protecting Illinois’ water resources.

• Dealing with Elevated Arsenic Levels

  Oct 7, 2011 9:30 am193 views

  Tom Holm and I presented the results from our study of arsenic in groundwater in the Tolono area at a public meeting this past Tuesday (October 4). The crowd was small but very interested in the topic, and asked a lot of good questions. In this post I thought Id post some of what Tom talked about regarding options for dealing with elevated arsenic in well water.

• 3 New Hydrogeologists

  Nov 18, 2019 5:00 pm197 views

  The Groundwater Section at the Illinois State Water Survey is pleased to welcome three new scientists to help with the research and service work we are doing: Cecilia Cullen, Mike Krasowski, and Allan Jones.

• Please Remove Pigs Before Drinking Water

  Mar 15, 2013 4:30 pm202 views

  I was looking through the front section of The New York Times the other day (March 13, 2013), and there were several articles having to do with water and water quality. There was an article about the lack of potable water in India, including the depletion of some groundwater supplies. Another article told how public schools in New York City are saving large volumes of water as a result of replacing thousands of old toilets with low-flush models. There was also an op-ed piece about how the melting of ice in the Arctic Ocean is opening up sea lanes and what that might mean. But the article that really caught my attention was in the World Briefing section about how 6,000 dead pigs were found floating in the Huangpu River in China, which provides drinking water to Shanghai. Ugh.

   

• Middle Illinois Region Water Supply Assessment Report Published

  Oct 10, 2018 11:15 am204 views

  A report on the water resources available in the Middle Illinois River water supply planning region is now available (Kelly et al. ISWS Contract Report 2018-02).

• 'Removing' Micropollutants from Wastewater

  Mar 1, 2013 3:15 pm207 views

  We ask a lot of our wastewater treatment plants (WWTPs). We expect them to clean up our sewage, so that the effluent that is returned to our water resources is environmentally benign. A century or more ago, the main goal was to prevent the spread of water-borne diseases, and treatment mainly consisted of dilution. Since that time, our environmental sensibilities have increased, and treatment techniques have been vastly improved to disinfect wastewater and remove pollutants to protect receiving waters. At first those pollutants were primarily limited to nutrients. Now we’re asking WWTPs to remove other things. Any idea what this compound is?

   

• More Good News on the Environment, This Time From Germany

  Jul 15, 2011 4:45 pm217 views

  About 6 months ago I wrote a post reporting on decreasing nitrate concentrations in Danish groundwater. The other day I ran across some encouraging news from a study in Germany, on organic pollutants in rivers.