<text>zzzzz• Q: Why are our lakes, rivers, and estuaries muddy and filled with debris after a heavy rain? Why can't we fish and swim in many of our waters despite the millions of dollars already spent on pollution control? • A: Largely because of a type of pollution called "nonpoint source pollution." Since the early 1970s federal and state governments have focused on controlling discharges from sewage treatment and industrial plants. Now that we've made progress in controlling these sources, state and local governments are concentrating on the serious water quality problems associated with nonpoint source pollution. • Q: What is nonpoint source pollution? • A: Unlike pollution from industrial and sewage treatment plants, it comes from many diffuse sources. Nonpoint source pollution is caused by rainfall or snowmelt moving over and through the ground. As the runoff moves, it picks up and carries away natural and manmade pollutants, finally depositing them into lakes, rivers, wetlands, coastal waters, and even our underground sources of drinking water. These pollutants include: • excess fertilizers, herbicides, and insecticides from agricultural lands and residential areas; • oil, grease, and toxic chemicals from urban runoff and energy production; • sediment from improperly managed construction sites, crop and forest lands, and eroding stream banks; • salt from irrigation practices and acid drainage from abandoned mines; • bacteria and nutrients from livestock, pet wastes, and faulty septic systems.• Q: What are the effects of these pollutants on our waters? • A: They've not been fully assessed, yet we know that these pollutants can have harmful effects on drinking water supplies, recreation, fisheries, and wildlife. • Q: What causes nonpoint source pollution? • A: We all play a part. Nonpoint source pollution results from a wide variety of human activities on the land. Each of us can contribute to the problem without even realizing it. • Q: What can we do about nonpoint source pollution? • A: We can all work together to reduce and prevent non- point source pollution. Some activities are federal responsibilities, such as ensuring that federal lands are properly managed to reduce soil erosion. Some are state responsibilities, for example, development of legislation governing mining, logging or groundwater protection. Others are best handled locally, such as zoning or erosion control ordinaces. And each individual can play an important role by practicing conservation and by changing certain everyday habits. Urban Stormwater Runoff* • Keep liner, pet wastes, leaves, and debris out of street gutters and storm drains—these drain directly to lakes, streams, and rivers. • Apply lawn and garden chemicals sparingly and according to directions. • Dispose of used oil, antifreeze, paints, and other household chemicals properly, not in storm sewers or down drains. If your community does not already have a program for collecting household hazardous wastes, ask your local government to establish one. • Clean up spilled brake fluid, oil, grease, and antifreeze. Do not hose them into the street where they can eventually reach local streams and lakes. • Control soil erosion on your property by planting ground cover and stabilizing erosion-prone areas. • Encourage local government officials to develop construction erosion/sediment control ordinances in your community.Mining*• Become involved in local mining issues by voicing your concerns about acid mine drainage, and reclamation projects in your area. Forestry* • Use proper logging and erosion control practices on your forest lands by ensuring proper construction, maintenance, and closure of logging roads and skid trails. • On public lands, report questionable logging practices to state and federal forestry and state water quality agencies. Agriculture* • Protect drinking water by using less pesticides. • Reduce soil erosion by using conservation tillage. • Use planned grazing systems on pasture and rangeland . • Dispose of pesticides, containers, and tank rinsate in an approved manner. * EPA is currently developing regulations requiring control of stormwater discharges which will include many types of nonpoint source pollution such as runoff from urban areas, construction sites, mining areas, and animal feedlots. Call EPA or your state water quality agency for more information. For More information in New Mexico contact:Environmental Protection Agency1445 Ross Ave.Dallas, Texas 75202(214) 655-7140"POLLUTED" United States Environmental Protection Agency. Office of Water. Washington, D.C. 20460. Pamphlet © 1990.</text>
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<text>You are about search for bibliographical information in the water resources database, brought to you by the New Mexico Museum of Natural History and the USDA Forest Service Partners in environmental education. To start browsing through the bibliography, just click on the mouse.</text>
<text>By Rose Ana BerbeoTHE ASSOCIATED PRESSA radical change in thinking is needed before many of New Mexico's rural communities will be able to meet federal drinking water standards, state lawmakers were told Friday.Leaders of small, rural communities must stop refusing to raise water user fees if they are going to upgrade their water systems, the executive director of the New Mexico Rural Water Association told a legislative interim committee.Gavin Strathdee appeared before the Environment, Land Use and Solid Waste Committee, which met in Albuquerque to hear reports on problems with infrastructure planning, water and air quality.Some communities have been fined, and others are expected to be because they cannot afford testing for harmful substances in water required under the 1986 amendments to the federal Safe Drinking Water Act, said Strathdee, whose association is a private, non-profit organization of community water systems."For many small communities, just taking a sample and getting it to a lab is very difficult," he said.Under federal law, the Environmental Protecdon Agency can impose fines of up to $25,000 a day on communities that do not comply with safety standards, he said.While the EPA hasn't levied that fine on any New Mexico communities, it has fined some towns $10,000, Strathdee said.But leaders of many rural, unincorporated communities, some with as few as 100 families, refuse to raise water rates because of political or other reasons, he said.In most small towns, the average residential user fee is $8 to $10 a month, Strathdee said.Those communities will have to start charging $35 to $40 a month before they win be able to afford water testing, which can add up to thousands of dollars a year, he said.During the last legislative session, $500,000 was anocated for rural water testing."... Communities aren't looking to themselves to make the changes. A radical change in thinking is necessary," Strathdee said.This year, the state has identified 39 of New Mexico's 639 mostly rural water systems as consistent viohtors of federal standards, Strathdee said.Communities of 10,000 or more people have until Jan. 1 to comply, Strathdee said.Berbeo, Rose Ann. "Rural Drinking Water Lacks Tests, Panel Told." Assosciated Press Story in Albuquerque Journal. 15 July 1990. E6.</text>
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<text>Berbeo, Rose Ann. "Rural Drinking Water Lacks Tests, Panel Told." Assosciated Press Story in Albuquerque Journal. 15 July 1990. E6.</text>
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<text>Berner, Elizabeth K., Robert A. Berner. "The Global Water Cycle." New Jersey: Prentice-Hall, Inc. 1987.</text>
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<text>This book studies natural waters by approaching it through a discussion on an elementary level of the geological, biological, physical, and anthropogenic which control the chemical composition of water around the world.</text>
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<text>Brower, Ken. "Turning Paradise into Petrodollars." In "Earthworks: Ten Years on the Environmental Front. ed, Mary Lou Van Deventer. San Francisco: Friends of the Earth. 1980. pp 79-86.</text>
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<text>By Dan CaseyJOURNAL STAFF WRITERMountainview residents and state offlcials want to choose their own lab to determine what's polluting groundwater in the rural Albuquerque area, after hearing that another federally contracted lab botched a second round of tests."We can no longer trust tbem," said Mountainview Advisory Council member Sherry Garley in a Tuesday news conference called to blast the Environmental Protection Agency. "Again our tax dollars have been wasted. Again we must wait several months to know one way or another."In the past two years, the federal EPA has thrown out two separate tests intended to detect explosive chemicals because of mistakes made by private labs.Mountainview residents and officials for the state Environmental Improvement Division only heard about the second botched test results during a meeting with EPA officials Aug. 24."Many people have already hooked up to city wells," said activist Michael Guerrero of the Southwest Organizing Project, which is working with residents to get the water cleened up. "But this--is a rural area. Many still use their private wells to irrigate fields and water livestock."State and federal officials have found high levels of nitrates polluting Mountainview's groundwater since 1961. Mountainview lies south of Rio Bravo SW between I-25 and the Rio Grande.No one knows what caused the pollution. Well-water samples taken by state officials since 1985 have routinely turned up explosives such as nytroglycerin, said Sheri Sinclair, an EID geologist.But she said more rigorous federally supervised tests are necessary to qualify for federal Superfund grants. The Superfund is used to clean up hazardous wastes that cannot be directly traced to a single responsible party.The EPA hired the Roy F. Weston Lab in 1988 to analyze water samples. But, Sinclair said, the lab left its samples sitting on a shelf too long to be valid.Last April, the EPA contracted the Houston-based Anachon Laboratories, but Anachon chemists failed to follow its contract, Sinclair said. She noted the EPA has refused to pay Anachon labs and is seeking reimbursement for a third set of tests.She said it's tough to find labs qualified to do such tests.EPA officials could not be reached for comment at press time.Mountainview residents want a role in the next round of tests, with one set of water samples going to the EPA, another to the state and a third to a lab chosen by the neighborhood group. The state wants to help the EPA pick a lab.But Sinclair said EPA regulations bar state, officials and community members from knowing the identity of labs doing such tests to avoid influencing the findings.Even if the next round of tests in the late fall does find explosive contaminants, Sinclair said, residents will still have to wait several years while Superfund officials sort through dozens of other priority cleanup sites.Casey, Dan. "Mountainview Fed Up Over Water Tests." Albuquerque Journal.</text>
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<text>Casey, Dan. "Mountainview Fed Up Over Water Tests." Albuquerque Journal.</text>
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<text>By Tony Davis staff reporterSandia National Laboratories should not dump 50,000 gallons of low-level radioactive waste water into the local sewer system until a study is done of the environmental effects of similar discharges, eight City Council members say.In a memo to Mayor Louis Saavedra on Wednesday, the councilors say Sandia should pay the estimated $5,000 cost of the study.The waste water comes from experiments at Sandia last year and is stored in a 50,000 gallon tank at the labs. It contains three radioactive elements: cobalt 60, cesium-137 and cerium-144.The labs and the U.S Department of Energy have said Sandia's proposed discharge poses little or no health risk.Radioactivity levels are well below an existing state and federal limits for sewage discharges, DOE has said.DOE has even said the waste water is safe enough to drink because it meets federal drinking water standards.The councilors' memo, however, says:"Recent research findings indicate that there is no safe minimum level of radiation exposure. As more has become known about the health effects of low-level radiation, exposure levels have decreased progressively."As a result, we ask that special care be taken in establishing radioactive waste discharge standards in Albuquerque and that the existing standards be reviewed for current acceptability," the councilors' letter said.City Hall's discharge rules allow radioactive sewage dumping only from licensed medical facilities.But approving Sandia's discharge could set a precedent, because there may be other Albuquerque businesses that are not medical businesses that want to discharge low-level radioactive wastes, the councilors' memo warned.DOE and Sandia are reviewing the councilors' memo and cannot say now whether they will fund the $5,000 study, DOE spokeswoman Anna Bachicha said Friday.Saavedra's chief administrative officer, Art Blumenfeld, however, said the councilor's suggestion "seems like a reasonable request."While the mayor's office generally supports Sandia's plan, it hasn't sent a formal proposal to the council yet."We need to make sure all the proper points are covered," Blumenfeld said.Originally, City Hall's waste water utility division had denied Sandia's request. It reversed itself this spring after becoming convinced the discharge would do no harm, utility division officials have said.DOE also strongly implied it would sue City Hall to reverse the waste water utility's original decision.Davis, Tony. "Councilors seek study on dumping radioactive water." Albuquerque Tribune. 18 May 1991. A5.</text>
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<text>Davis, Tony. "Councilors seek study on dumping radioactive water." Albuquerque Tribune. 18 May 1991. A5.</text>
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<text>HIGH COUNTRY NEWS August 27, 1990EPA's Reilly Favors Nuclear Dump at WIPP By Tony Davis The man who slammed the door on the Two Forks Dam may soon help open the door for the proposed Waste Isolation Pilot Plant nuclear waste dump outside Carlsbad, N.M.In recent public statements, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency Administrator William Reilly and his staff have given every indication that they will grant the U.S. Department of Energy a precedent-setting, temporary waiver from the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act. The federal law normally forbids burial of hazardous wastes without either treating it to reduce toxicity, or proving that the waste will not leak into underground water tables as long as it remains hazardous.The DOE hopes to bury more than 6.3 million cubic feet of transuranic waste in WIPP's 2,150-foot-deep salt caverns. Transuranics are radioactive elements heavier than uranium that have relatively low radiation levels, but extremely long half-lives. Half of the wasteΓÇörags, clothes, metal and glass pieces contaminated with plutonium from over 40 years of nuclear bomb productionΓÇöis also contaminated with hazardous chemicals or other toxic waste. The waiver, which EPA has proposed but not formally approved, follows a "no-migration" petition from the DOE that asserts that the hazardous wastes will not move into neighboring groundwater supplies, during a l0-year test phase.Without approval of the petition, the DOE would be forced to spend hundreds of millions of dollars to treat the wastes to make them less hazardous. The project has already cost the federal govemment more than $800 million.In a recent exchange of letters, Reilly and Energy Secretary James Watkins called the petition their top priority. It will be the first large-scale no-migration petition the EPA has ever ruled on. A final decision is due in late September. DOE hopes to start hauling wastes to WIPP in January 1991, two years and three months after the repository's first scheduled opening date.But the waiver is also likely to put Reilly in a court battle with several environmental groups, including the Natural Resources Defense Council and the Environmental Defense Fund. The groups contend the waiver would violate federal law and that Reilly is trying to help Watkins speed WlPP's opening.In a recent letter to Reilly, the environmentalists argued that federal law requires a would-be hazardous waste dumper to prove its wastes will not contaminate groundwater as long as they stay hazardous. Both EPA and the critics agree that such proof is not available now, and won't be available until DOE finishes computer studies of WIPP in 1994.Instead, the EPA has proposed to allow DOE to bury a few thousand drums of mixed hazardous-radioactive wastes in WIPP for 10 years. The agency says during that time there is little chance these wastes will contaminate an aquifer that is 800 feet above the salt beds that feeds the Pecos River.With the waiver, DOE would conduct highly controversial underground tests to measure how much hydrogen and other gases the repository will produce. In mid-July, Reilly told several Washington, D.C., newspapers that allowing the mixed wastes would be a valuable scientific test of the repository's long-term safety. Indeed, EPA has urged DOE to put more wastes into the ground for testing than DOE itself has proposed, to learn more about WIPP's safety.The project's critics say all those tests could be conducted above ground. They worry that once radioactive and hazardous waste is buried, it will be politically impossible to remove it, no matter what the test results show.The environmental groups also note that year 1989-90 than it spent the same year to rewrite the agency's much broader and farther reaching radioactive waste disposal standards. In 1987, a federal judge tossed out the old standards, which set the maximum amount of radioactivity that can escape into the environment from a nuclear waste dump. EPA expects to finish rewriting them in 1992."EPA is driven by DOE's plans for WIPP," contends Don Hancock, an activist with Albuquerque's Southwest Research and Information Center, a longtime opponent of the project. "DOE needs the no-migration variance to put wastes into the ground. But it doesn't need to have the waste-disposal standards to put wastes into the ground."Even with the no-migration waiver, however, DOE still couldn't open WIPP until it persuades Congress to pass a land-withdrawal bill transferring ownership of WIPP's 10,240 acres from the U.S. Bureau of Land Management to DOE. The state of New Mexico also must set the routes for WIPP's trucks to travel.In addition, DOE must purchase potash mining leases for land near WIPP from private owners and prove that its system of air pollution monitors at WIPP works. It must also show it can produce a cask suitable for carrying the wastes, which it so far has not done.Last year, the U.S Nuclear Regulatory Commission certified the design of the DOE's stainless steel, cylindrical TRUPACT II waste shipping containers. But the first 15 container models that rolled off a private contractor's assembly line this year did not meet the company's specifications. So the contractor is trying again.Davis, Tony. "EPA's Reilly Favors Nuclear Dump at WIPP." HIGH COUNTRY NEWS. August 27, 1990.</text>
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<text>Davis, Tony. "EPA's Reilly Favors Nuclear Dump at WIPP." High Country News. August 27, 1990.</text>
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<text>ALBUQUERQUE TRIBUNE May 16, 1990ARSENIC IN THE H20By Tony DavisOutlying communities are finding that arsenic in their water supplies has become an increasing concern, sometimes costing millions to correct. Now Albuquerque's water is being examined for its arsenic content.Arsenic, a poison found in small amounts in several New Mexico communities' water, is stirring concerns at City Hall about Albuquerque's water.Since the early 1970s, arsenic has been found in some Albuquerque drinking water supplies at potentially troublesome levels, say City Hall water officials.So far, virtually none of the city water going to residents has arsenic above federal drinking water limits.However, the Environmental Protection Agency is considering lowering the federal drinking water limit for arsenic to where at least four of the city's 42 reservoirs would have water with excessive arsenic.Plus, city water officials say they don't know where the arsenic is coming from, although they have several theories."I think arsenic for Albuquerque has the serious potential to be a problem," says Sam Cummins, a top city water official. "We're finding that the more you find out, the more you learn that there's a lot more that you don't know."Even if the EPA doesn't lower the standard, Albuquerque may still face an arsenic problem requiring water treatment, says Cummins."It could be that as we pump the system harder, we could get a universal rise in arsenic," says Cummins, manager of water and waste water for the city's utilities planning division.The levels of arsenic found in city water are far, far below what could cause immediate health problems, say state environmental officials.But EPA officials say they're not sure of either the short or long-term health risks of drinking water with the amount of arsenic found in numerous city wells and a handful of city water reservoirs."We don't have enough data," said Charles Abernathy, an EPA toxicologist in Washington, D.C.Today, city officials are spending $750,000 on a private consultant's study of what to do about the arsenic.The study, due in October, will recommend how the city should treat the water, if necessary, and where the city should drill new wells to avoid areas where the ground water is high in arsenic.So far, only one water sample out of more than 900 that city water officials have taken from reservoirs has had arsenic at above the drinking water standard. The reservoirs take water from wells, hold it and then pipe it to homes and businesses.Since late 1987, City Hall has kept a previously little-used West Mesa well closed because after lengthy pumping, its water had arsenic above the federal limit.Another west side well used only for firefighting also has had arsenic above federal limits.The city has two other west side drinking wells on standby only use because they pumped water with high arsenic levels, but averaged below the federal limits. Five other wells, three on the West Mesa, one in South Albuquerque and three in the Northeast Heights, have pumped water with arsenic at or above the standard in at least one of the 1,000-plus tests the city has taken from wells.Only one of those five had an average reading that was close to the standard, however. City officials say they use that well as little as possible.So far, the city has kept the arsenic level in water going to homes far below the limits by blending it with other water that has less arsenic, officials say."We're dealing with it, and here's no need to panic. That would be irrational," said Keny Summers, a geologist and ground water scientist for City Hall's Public Works Department. "But to do nothing would be worse."Tiny particles of arsenic are aturany mixed in soil with other elements such as oxygen, chlorine and sulfur. It's almost certain the arsenic source in the water is from nature, not humans, officials say.One possibility is that continued deeper pumping is causing city wells to reach where there is more arsenic.Another is that arsenic is coming southwest in the Rio Grande underground water basin from other communities near the Jemez Mountains that have had arsenic in their water. Some hot springs around the Jemez Springs area have arsenic concentrations above federal standards, and much of the Albuquerque water with arsenic concentrations is also the warmest water that the city pumps.Some city officials speculate that the warm water pumped from the ground in Albuquerque has its roots in the Jemez area water.Another theory is that geologic faulting activity may have created fractures in underground rocks that allow arsenic to rise closer to the surface.But arsenic in ground water is hardly new in the West.ΓÇó For several years, the small Sandoval County town of San Ysidro has used a federal grant to hook expensive water treatment systems to all residents' taps to remove arsenic.The Jemez Pueblo just north of San Ysidro also has had arsenic in public water supplies that at times exceeded federal limits.ΓÇó The town of Bernalillo is in the middle of a $2 million project to drill new wells and install a new water line because arsenic slightly above federal limit turned up in its water.ΓÇó Arsenic levels in ground in water regularly top federal standards in many parts of neighboring Arizona. However, the average Arizona reading is far below the limit, a recent report from a United States Geological Survey official in Tucson said.ΓÇó Arsenic levels in ground water ranging from 10 to 50 parts per billion and up are common throughout much of, the western United States, said the technical magazine Ground Water in 1988. The federal limit is 50.</text>
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<text>Davis, Tony. "Arsenic in the H20." Albuquerque Tribune. 16 May 1990.</text>
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<text>Gallegos, Ernistine. Water Information Network Review. Albuquerque. V1 N2. p 4. 1989.Albuquerque's San Jose CommunltyBattles Water Pollutlonby Ernestine GallegosResidents of one of the oldest neighborhoods in AIbuquerque have organized the San Jose Community Awareness Council to ensure their input into the clean up of New Mexico's highest ranked toxlc waste site. The San Jose Superfund Site covers a one-square-mile area that contains high levels of solvents and petroleum contaminants ln ground water below six industrial properties. In 1982, the U.S. Envlronmental Protectlon Agency designated the area as a Superfund site and now estimates that clean-up of the soil and ground water could take 30 years.Within four months of the formatlon of the San Jose Awareness Council, a significant increase in the responsiveness of government officials to comrnunity concerns has occurred. The Council met with Senator Pete Domenici and Congressman Steve Schiff, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), the state Envlronmental Improvement Dlvision (EID), and a county commissioner. The Councll demanded and received information briefings from the EPA and EID, and requested increased federal and county government oversight of local polluters.In January 1989, the Councll notifled EPA of its intent to apply for a Superfund Technical Assistance Grant that wlll be used to hire technical experts to review and comment on clean-up plans for the Superfund area. At about the same time, members of the Council were asked to serve on an ad hoc EPA committee which will review the design of clean-up systems at the Superfund site.Other activities of the San Jose Community Awareness Council include monitoring the investigation of a 1,000 gallon gasoline leak at the Bernalmo County Publlc Works Department maintenance yard, monitoring illegal dumping, and advocating for the rerouting of commercial truck traffic. The Council will sponsor a benefit enchilada dinner on March 17 to raise funds to support ongoing activities. Anyone interested ln contributing to the Council should call the ofiice at 243-4837.</text>
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<text>Gallegos, Ernistine. Water Information Network Review. Albuquerque. V1 N2. p 4. 1989.</text>
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<text>By James E. GarciaCox News ServiceCIUDAD JUAREZ, MexicoΓÇöThe ditch that runs along the south bank of the Rio Grande for 18 miles carries millions of gallons a day of untreated household and industrial sewage. It is called la agua negraΓÇöSpanish for the black water.For decades, wastes have seeped from the unlined canal into the groundwater and the river, experts say. La agua negra is among the many pollutants that make the Rio Grande one of America's most contaminated riversΓÇöendangering the health of an estimated 3.5 million residents along the Texas -Mexico border."It's a shame for the people who live along what was once a proud river," said Laurance Nickey, director of the El Paso City-County Health Department. "When I was a boy, I swam in it. I wouldn't even dip my big toe in it now. The quality is nil."The 1,885-mile Rio GrandeΓÇöwhich begins with melting snow in the San Juan Mountains of ColoradoΓÇöis rushing toward an environmental disaster.It is being fouled by household sewage, runoff from cities, toxic chemicals from factories, pesticides from farms and sediment from mines. Other pollutants range from salt to radioactivity.In most cases, the wastes are the byproducts of the booming population and industrial revolution along the border. Under a free-trade agreement being negotiated by the United States and Mexico, environmentalists fear, development will increaseΓÇöand so win the destructive pollution of the Rio Grande.The Rio Grande has become one of "the most polluted rivers in the United States," said Texas Lt. Gov. Bob Bullock. He said the region's growth is draining the river and the government resources needed to manage it.Added John Hall, chairman of the Texas Water Commission: "Water quality standards are being violated downstream of virtually every pair of sister cities on the river."For example, the ditch known in Juarez as la agua negra carries up to 30 million gallons of untreated sewage a day, according to health officials in El Paso.Besides household sewage, the canal carries industriaI wastes. More than 260 foreign-owned plants, called maquiladoras, have located around Juarez and El Paso since 1982, reflecting a trend an along the border.Environmentalists and government officials say many maquilas illegally dump toxic wastes into Juarez's sewers, which flow into the black-water ditch."It's contaminated with sludge, human excrement and chemicals," Nickey said.South of Juarez, la agua negra is diluted with Rio Grande water to irrigate vegetable and cotton fields. Health officials believe some of the pollution eventually washes or leaches into the Rio Grande and the underground aquifers.El Paso and Juarez get most of their drinking water from the Hueco and Mesilla aquifers, which environmentalists fear are being contaminated by pollution from the ditch or factories on both sides of the river.While El Paso, with 560,000 residents, has a modern water treatment system, Juarez (population 1.2 million) doesn't. Neither do many of the unincorporated U.S.-Mexico border communities known as colonias, where health conditions resemble those of the Third World.In El Paso County, about 70,000 people live in colonias with no public sewer or water service. They often have no choice but to drink contaminated water, Nickey said.Ruben Herrera, who lives with his wife and grandchildren in a colonia near San Elizario, said, "We shouldn't, but there are people who drink the water." They have a two-room block-and-adobe house 50 feet from the Rio Grande.Herrera pumps groundwater to wash clothes and bathe, but he knows not to drink it."It turns yellow if you leave it in a bucket for two hours," he said. Instead, Herrera drives three miles every morning to a lumberyard, where the manager lets him fill two 5-gallon jugs with drinking water.Many people blame water pollution for diseases such as hepatitis, a sometimes fatal inflammation of the liver.In the colonias near San Elizario, hepatitis rates are at least five times the U.S. average.Encephalitis also is a problem. The disease, which causes lethargy and brain damage, is spread by mosquitoes that breed in la agua negra, among other places, health authorities say.Further down the river, the Mexican city of Nuevo Laredo, population 400,000, dumps a combined 20 million to 25 million gallons of wastes a day into the river.As it flows through that city's downtown, the Rio Grande has a fecal contamination level exceeding 200,000 coliform bacteria per milliliter. That's 1,000 times the Texas limit.Near the end of the Rio Grande in Mexico, the problem is not only the quality but also the quantity of the water in the river. Joseph Chance, a researcher at the University of Texas-Pan American at Edinburg, calls it "a classic case of a finite resource.""It's going to be like California and Arizona, where the farming interests and the city users are cheek to jaw over this small amount of water," Chance said.Garcia, James. "Black Water." Cox News Service Story in Albuquerque Tribune. 15 October 1991. D1.</text>
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<text><span class="style3">arcia, James. "Black Water." Cox News Service Story in Albuquerque Tribune. 15 October 1991. D1.</span></text>
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<text>Solution to Colorado drinking water pollutionHigh Contry News - December 31, 1990A major pipeline plan- will replace nitrate-contaminated drinking water with clean mountain water in several northern Colorado towns. Some Platte Valley famiing towns have reached contamination levels five times higher than the federal limit of 10 milligams per liter of drinking water. The Northern Colorado Water Conservancy District's $100 million project will pump water from the Big Thompson and Windy Gap projects to Platte Valley towns and rural areas of much of northeastern Colorado and part of Nebraska. An outline of-the plan is expected in early 1991. According to Jerry Biberstine, head of the Colorado Department of Health's drinking-water program, nitrates threaten pregnant women and babies and are directly related to loss of IQ and slow development in children. Nitrates from fertilizers, feedlot animal wastes and human sewage that seep into groundwater cause contamination. A five-year Environmental Protection Agency study found low levels of nitrates in more than 50 percent of drinking-water wells nationwide.High Country News. "Solution to Colorado Drinking Water Pollution." High Country News. 31 December 1990. Page 6.</text>
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<text>High Country News. "Solution to Colorado Drinking Water Pollution." High Country News. 31 December 1990. Page 6.</text>
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<text>It's wartime at Seal Beach Naval Weapons Station. The dogfaces are preparing for battle. Stuffed in their wallets, a picture of their best girl. Hanging from their necks, dogtags engraved with names like Pseudomonas, Alcaligenes, Nocardia, and Micrococcus.In their hearts, courage and pride. In their canteens, nitrogen and phosphorous. Granted this is not your ordinary mess-hall cocktail, but these are not your ordinary GIs. These are soldiers of fortune. These are, as microbiologist Harry Ridgway puts it, "A helluva group of bugs." In one of the sterile labs at the Orange County Water District (OCWD) where he heads up the biotechnology research department, Ridgway observes a small battle taking place. In plastic petri dishes, he has pitted his soldiers against the enemyΓÇö petroleum. Ridgway's war even has a name. Bioremediation. "The technology has been around for decades," he says, pointing to tiny dots of bacteria growing on the petris, "but there wasn't enough understood about the microbiology of the process until recently." Bioremediation gained some notoriety in Alaska last year when the technology was used for test studies on 70 of the more than 1,000 miles of oil-stained beaches tainted by the Exxon Valdez tanker spill. For the past 10 years, General Electric biologists have been studying bioremediation in hopes of ridding the Hudson River of the carcinogenic PCB's (polychlorinated biphenyls) the company had sent into that river from the 1940s until it discovered the problem that created. But contamination does not lurk only in open waters. Drinking water supplies, seemingly safe beneath the earth, also are vulnerable. Gasoline, for example, if leaked from a truck or gas tank can make its way into a groundwater basin, rendering it unusable. "Bioremediation simply makes use of a special category of microorganisms, harmless to humans, that are already present in the soil, to degrade a contaminant spill," says Ridgway. These bugs show no mercy, take no prisoners. Their mission is to consume, to literally eat gasoline for lunch, leaving in its place clean water and harmless carbon dioxide. Though he calls them bugs, Ridgway notes the microorganisms he employs are neither animal nor vegetable, but bacteria that can metabolize the more than 200 hydrocarbon compounds that make up such refined petroleum products as gasoline.But it requires teamwork. Usually a single bacterial strain can attack only three or four of the compounds. It takes a mixture, a consortium of bacterial types, to degrade all the hydrocarbons present. When a spill occurs, the bacteria smell breakfast. "The petroleum actually activates dormant bacteria," says Ridgway. "They begin to break down the compounds and incorporate them into their own cell material." But they may be very slow eaters. Nutrients are added to stimulate bacterial growth, most commonly nitrogen (usually in the form of ammonia or nitrate) and phosphorous. "No matter how much petroleum there is," says Ridgway, "the bacteria won't grow if nutrients aren't present. When the nutrients run out, the bacteria become dormant again. Such an environment is being created at a test site in Seal Beach where OCWD and Stanford University biologists, with the help of a mobile laboratory, have marched 15 miles north to the Seal Beach Naval Weapons Station. Seven years ago, a gas tank under the base's filling station leaked about 5,000 gallons of gasoline into a small underground basin. "We chose the Seal Beach siteΓÇö also home to a 5,000-acre national wildlife refugeΓÇöfor our field testing because its spill is relatively small and confined to a shallow aquifer, about 10 feet below the ground," says Ridgway. On one side of the spill, four stainless steel bioreactors are filled with contaminated soil from the site and planted in the ground. Tainted groundwater is slowly sent through the bioreactors, then returned to the aquifer. All the while hungry microbes chomp away at unwanted petroleum hydrocarbons like benzene and naphthanlene. "What we're doing is creating highly selective nutrient conditions in the bioreactors, which stimulate the growth of bacteria," says Ridgway. "The desired result is complete destruction of the petroleum hydrocarbon, just clean water left in the basin and carbon dioxide released to the atmosphere.'' Wars can be expensive, but bioremediation costs somewhat less than your average battle. "Because bioremediation actually takes place at the site of the spill, it's one of the most cost-effective methods of cleanup," says Ridgway. Louis Fernandez, Chief Executive Officer of the biotechnology company Cellgene, sees so much promise in the new technology that he predicts 20 percent of Superfund sites could be restored with bioremediation. Other techniques, including incineration, air stripping of the hydrocarbons, or granular activated carbon filtration have all proven effective, but cost can be high and these processes may pollute the air. With biological technologies still in the development stages, however, these techniques may conquer a spill more quickly than bioremediation. Ridgway figures the Seal Reach spill ΓÇöconsidered small to moderate in sizeΓÇöwill need about six months to one year of treatment before it's completely decontaminated. Still, he expects microbe warfare to become very popular. "In another five years," he says, "biological processes for petroleum spills will be just another accepted cleanup technology." Perhaps the best cleanup technology. Soon Ridgway will try something new and even more daring. His group is now shifting gears to combat some of the nastiest chemicals ever known to set up camp in a groundwater basin: trichloroethylene (TCE), perchloroethylene (PCE) and others. These are the compounds whose presence has closed numerous wells in Southern California. According to Ridgway, TCE (a grease-removing and dry-cleaning solvent that commonly contaminates groundwater wells) can be treated with bioremediation, but is proving stubborn, resistant to many bacteria. Still, he welcomes the challenge. "We're constantly looking for a single kind of bacteria that can degrade many different chemicals better and faster. We're always looking for Superbugs." He's convinced they're out there, lying dormant in some foxhole, waiting for their call to duty. He just has to find them.Hofer, Gary. "Superbugs." Aqueduct. Published by Metropolitan Water District of Southern California. V 57. N2. 1990. Pp 26-28.</text>
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<text>Hofer, Gary. "Superbugs." Aqueduct. Published by Metropolitan Water District of Southern California. V 57. N2. 1990. Pp 26-28.</text>
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<text>SUBJECTS 1. Sewage disposal plants--Environmental aspects--New Mexico--Chama. 2. Sewage disposal into lakes, streams, etc.--Environmental aspects--New Mexico--Chama Region. 3. Water quality--New Mexico--Chama Region. LOCATION Science and Engineering Library CALL NUMBER TD525 C48 J32 1983 </text>
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<text>Jacobi, Gerald Z. "Intensive survey of the Rio Chamita and Rio Chama, near Chama, Rio Arriba County, New Mexico, March 22-23, 1982." Santa Fe, N.M. : New Mexico Health and Environment Dept., [1983]. </text>
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card_15119.xml
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<text>By Rene KimballJOURNAL STAFF WRITERCity officials have refused to look into and fix environmental problems at the old South Eubank landfill that the State Land Office contends could lead to groundwater contamination.City solid waste and wastewater officials say the State Land Office, which owns the 40-acre parcel, is trying to pin problems on them that they didn't cause. They also said tests at a nearby well haven't turned up any evidence of groundwater contamination.Consequently, the case may wind up in court, said Nicholas Black, associate counsel for the Land Office.Among the potential groundwater problems is more than 26 million gallons of raw sewage that was dumped by an adjacent mobile home park onto the closed landfill in the late 1970s and early 1980s, Black said.The South Eubank landfill was used by the city from 1962 until 1974, when it was closed.The state is pressing the city and the mobile home park to install and pay for four groundwater monitoring wells at the closed dump, located west of Four Hills and east of Kirtland Air Force Base.Black's office also wants the city to cover exposed garbage with more dirt and recontour the landfill surface to eliminate areas where rainwater ponds, he said.State officials fear water and sewage seeping into the old dump may cause contaminants to leach out of it and seep down to the water table, Black said.The landfill was built in the historic channel of the Tijeras Arroyo. Water rushing down the arroyo against the east embankment has undercut the dump and exoposed trash, he said."We have tried to get Gene Romo and his crew to do something about it, and they have turned a deaf ear to us," said Black, referring to the city's Solid Waste Management Department director.Romo said the city closed the landfill properly by covering it with two feet of dirt, in accordance with the law at that time.The State Land Office accepted the city's closure in writing in October 1974, he said, then leased the property to the late Roy Shaw, who allowed private constractors and construction companies to dump construction waste there.Shaw Mobile Home Park, located just north of the landfill, also has been targeted by the State Land Office because it put a sewer line through the closed landfill in the early 1980s. The line empties into the city sewer system.The sewer line was put in after the park for more than two years had dumped sewage into trenches on the landfill, Black said.Concerns about sewage leaking into the landfill continue, he said, because the line was poorly constructed and has failed in the past.The city should assume some responsibility for sewage spills because it allowed Shaw to obtain city water service for three years before it required him to hook up to sewers, Black said."My calculation is as much as 26.4 million gallons of sewage may have gone on top of the landfill," Black said. "The concern that we have up here is where is that 26 million gallons of sewage with relation to the groundwater?""We're very adamant that it's not our problem," said Dave Brosman, assistant Public Works Department director in charge of water and wastewater.He said the city allowed the mobile home park to hook into its sewer system to help the bad sewage situation there. "We did not aggravate the problem, we tried to solve the problem, and now that there may be a problem, they (the State Land Office) are simply trying to pass the buck," Brosman said.Water samples taken since 1988 from a single test well near the landfill haven't turned up any groundwater problems, said Bill Bennett of the city Environmental Health Department.City, state and federal enviromnental officials and a consulting hydrologist in Santa Fe said it's highly unlikely the groundwater beneath the landfill is contaminated because it lies 550 feet beneath the surface.Kimball, Rene. "State Claims Dump May Pollute Water." Albuquerque Journal. 20 June 1990. D1.</text>
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<text>Kimball, Rene. "State Claims Dump May Pollute Water." Albuquerque Journal. 20 June 1990. D1.</text>
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card_2497.xml
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<text>By Rene KimballJOURNAL STAFF WRITERThe words "nitrate contamination" are familiar to many South Valley residents whose domestic wells for decades have been pumping up water tainted with the pollutant.And even though city water utility customers may have considered themselves immune to such problems, city officials now know nitrates pose a threat to some municipal wells in the Northeast Height because of leaky septic tanks.That situation illustrates why city offfcials are trying to interest the public throughout the city in groundwater protection. It's time to end the myth that bad water is a South Valley problem, they say, and involve the wider community in discussions about how to protect drinking water in the Middle Rio Grande Basin."Water knows no political boundaries. This is not Northeast Heights vs. South Yalley," said Sam Cummins of the city Public Works Department's Utilities Planning Division.A citizens' advisory committee, some city and county department heads and a consulting engineering firm have come up with a preliminary list of broad water quality goals and objectives that will be the subject of a series of public meetings later this month, Cummins said."The message to the community is we need to take some very calculated, well-planned action to secure our water future for the next 50 years," Cummins said. "We need to become much more sensitive to our use of water and its disposal."The process could yield, for example, a recommendation that a government board be formed to protect and regulate groundwater protection much as the city-county Air Quality Control Board regulates air quality, Cummins said.Industry would prefer to have policies they can count on because they know ahead of time what it will cost to comply, he said."If laws and regulations are passed in panic, they tend to be less rational," he added.The Heights nitrate contamination is only one of numerous groundwater threats in metropolitan Albuquerque being studied by a citizens' advisory committee formed in late 1988.The citizens' advisory committee, along with a committee of city and county department heads, has been looking at protection of groundwater as part of an overall city water resources planning effort.The groups are planning to mount a major effort this month to educate and involve the public in groundwater issuesΓÇömuch as the city has been able to enlist public interest in air pollution concerns, city officials said.The idea is to come up with plans to protect groundwater in the Middle Rio Grande Basin and East Mountain areas before contamination reaches crisis proportions, Cummins said.Ultimately, the groups will propose specific water protection steps to the City Council by the end of next summer, he said.The study area, which stretches south to Socorro and takes in East Mountain communities, has at least 126 documented cases of water pollution by septic tanks, underground storage tanks leaking gasline and chemicals associated with industrial activity.Kimball, Rene. "Group Hopes to Ensure Safe Groundwater." Albuquerque Journal. 8 June 1990. C1.</text>
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<text>Kimball, Rene. "Group Hopes to Ensure Safe Groundwater." Albuquerque Journal. 8 June 1990. C1.</text>
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card_7858.xml
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<text>SUBJECTS 1. Fishes--Ecology. 2. Fishes, Effect of water pollution on--United States. 3. Sulphate pulping process. LOCATION Zimmerman Government Publications CALL NUMBER #EP 1.89/2:P 96/2 </text>
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<text>Leach, J. M. "Development of a Chemical Toxicity Assay for Pulp Mill Effluents." Cincinnati, OH : U.S. Environmental Protection Agency Industrial Environmental Research Laboratory : Center for Environmental Research Information [distributor], 1981.</text>
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card_15857.xml
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<text>SUBJECTS 1. Acid pollution of rivers, lakes, etc.--New Mexico. 2. Acid precipitation (Meteorology)--Environmental aspects--NewMexico. 3. Water--Pollution--New Mexico. 4. Metals--Environmental aspects--New Mexico. 5. Lake ecology--New Mexico. 6. Water quality--New Mexico. 7. Wilderness areas--Environmental aspects--New Mexico. LOCATION Science and Engineering Library CALL NUMBER GB705 N6 N64 no.234 </text>
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<text>Lynch, Thomas R. et al. "Assessing the Sensitivity of High Altitude New Mexican Wilderness lakes to acidic precipitation and Trace Metal Contamination." Las Cruces, N.M. : New Mexico Water Resources Research Institute, New Mexico State University, [1988] </text>
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<text>/* Written 4:52 pm Feb 25, 1991 by christic in cdp:christic.news *//* ---------- "28 TOP CENSORED STORIES OF 1990" ---------- */-----------------------------------------------------------------THE NATION'S WATERWAYS: WHAT YOU CAN'T SEE CAN HURT YOU Project Censored: Nomination for the ``Ten Best Censored Stories of 1990'' Many of America's fresh and salt water bays, harbors, lakes, and riverbeds are lined with toxic waste. When the water flows over or rests on these contaminated muds, pollutants such as DDT, PCB, and heavy metal are released. The toxins in the water are eaten by organisms which in turn are eaten by fish and then subsequently passed on to humans who eat the fish. Deformed birds, contaminated shellfish, cancerous fish, and threats to human health are the results of this toxic food chain. A 1987 study by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) showed that nearly every major U.S. harbor and body of water likely suffers from sediment contamination. In the Great Lakes alone, 41 severely polluted sites have been identified and the salt water coasts are equally contaminated. Those underwater wastelands become toxic sediments by soaking up pollutants from land fills, sewage plants, and other sources. "Under-water sediments are the last stop for everything from pesticides sprayed on fields to heavy metals released into the air," says Brett Hulsey, associate midwest representative of the Sierra Club. While these sediments are toxic enough when left alone, they become even more dangerous when they are stirred up by dredging equipment. Dredging is needed to clear out the silt that settles to the bottom of the bays, so they can facilitate shipping and commerce. Some of the most contaminated sites in the country are those that are cleared of silt regularly including New York's Hudson/Raritan estuary; the Boston, San Diego, Los Angeles, and Seattle harbors; and the Indiana Harbor and Canal in Lake Michigan. To keep such areas navigable, the U.S. Army of Corps of Engineers annually dredges 350 million cubic yards of sediment from the bottom of the nation's waterways--enough to encircle the earth with a cubic yard of muck eight times. Once the dredging is done, however, the next problem is where to put the toxic sediment. The Corps throws sediments judged safe on riverbanks or wetlands--or dumps them into the ocean at the rate of 45 million cubic yards a year. Because no federal stanards exist for sediment toxicity, the Corps uses its own tests, with EPA oversight, to determine which sediments are too dangerous to dump. It places these wastes in upland sites or in Combined Disposal Facilities (CDFs), holding ponds bordered by the shore and encircled by walls of fill. CDFs are short term answers though and "are rarely fenced or covered or even marked by warning signs," according to Glenda Daniel, executive director at the four-state Lake Michigan Federation. Daniel notes that "[i]n Chicago, for instance, children swim and anglers fish in a CDF adjacent to a public park." Despite the magnitude of the toxic sediments problem, no national program directly addresses underwater contamination. The EPA has no national criteria that restrict pollution of underwater sediments or that trigger cleanup and protection. Existing environmental laws place some restrictions on dredging and dumping, but the Corps makes its own decisions on which sediments are too toxic to dump. SOURCE: SIERRA MAGAZINE, May/June 1990, "The Dirty Deeps," by Beth Millemann, pp 29-32.----</text>
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<text>Millemann, B. (1990). "The Dirty Deeps," SIERRA MAGAZINE. May/June , pp 29-32.</text>
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<text>TESTS SHOW PECOS FISH OK TO EATALBUQUERQUE JOURNAL MAY 9, 1991BY BEN NEARYJOURNAL STAFF WRITERTests show trout from the Pecos River are safe to eat, the New Mexico Department of Game and Fish reports, and area merchants hope the news will perk up their sagging tourist trade.Meanwhile, Santa Fe National Forest officials announced Wednesday it will keep three popular campgrounds in the Pecos area closed this summer because of fears mining waste used to surface roads poses a heath threat to people who breathe contaminated dust.Pollution from abandoned mining operations upstream from the Village of Pecos washed into the river and killed about 86,000 fish at the state's Lisboa Spnngs hatchery this March.The fish started dying on March 7 ΓÇöthree days after a heavy rainfall sent melted snow into the river. Steve Henry, chief of fisheries management for Game and Fish, said tests of 44 fish taken from the hatchery and the river show elevated levels of zinc and aluminum which presumably killed them.However, the tests show nothing that would pose a health threat to humans eating the fish, he said. "The Department will immediately resume stocking the river from the Pecos hatchery," he said. "This is a really popular area and you ought to get up there."Erank Adelo of Adelo's store in Pecos said business has been down sharply since the die-off in March. For example, he said he's sold only 40 fishing licenses so far this year, compared to about 160 for the same period last year."All the storekeepers feel the same way," Adelo said. "We're hoping that they put out the news through you guys and the television that people will get the word. I would think that this would improve business."The U.S. Forest Service and Game and Fish closed campgrounds along the Pecos last year after tests revealed high levels of lead and other metals in road-surfacing material.Dolores Maese, public information assistant at the Pecos Ranger District, said Wednesday that her office has issued an advisory warning visitors that, "there is a problem with mine waste contamination within the upper reaches of the Pecos Canyon."Maese said the following campgrounds and roads will remain closed this summer: Jacks Creek Campground and Forest Road 555 which leads to it, Panchuela Campground and Forest Road 305, which leads to it, and Windsor Creek Campground and Forest Road 121 leading to it."There are heavy metals in the mine waste which may pose a health risk to people," Maese quoted from the release. "These are highly used camping areas, as well as a popular gateway to the Pecos Wilderness."These areas are closed indefinitely pending further assessment of health risk," Maese said. "They could possibly be closed for more than one year."Tom Dwyer, acting Pecos District Ranger, said that as well as being concerned with any possible health risk, "We are concerned for the well-being of the community of Pecos, being that tourism is their mainstay. We will continue providing the media and our forest visitors with up-to-the-minute news regarding the matter."Bob Jenks, assistant division chief of Habitat, Environment and Land for the N.M. Department of Game and Fish, said early this year the department will close both picnic enclosures at its Willow Creek Campground all this summer. Last year, the agency shut down only one.Since large-scale mining ceased in the area about 40 years ago, state and federal agencies have used gravel from mining waste to surface roads and other developed areas along the river. Metals have leached into the ground along the roads, killing vegetation.Tom O'Brien of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has been analyzing fish and animals along the Pecos to see how they've been affected by the mine waste. He concluded in December that small animals along the river have levels of lead in their bodies high enough to pose a possible hazard to eagles and other birds of prey.O'Brien said in December that although trout in the Pecos have elevated levels of lead in their bodies, it wasn't enough to pose a risk to people who eat them.Attempts to reach him for comment Wednesday were unsuccessful.Henry, of Game and Fish, said the recent tests of the fish in wake of the hatchery die-off showed the same slightly elevated levels of lead in native brown trout taken from the river as tests showed last year. However, despite the heavy runoff in March, he said the fish are still safe for human consumption.The Scientific Labs Division of the New Mexico Department of Health tested the fish. Henry said the tests found levels of zinc as high as 50 parts per million in the livers and other internal organs of fish. If the river weren't polluted with mine material, he said that level would be about one-tenth of a part per million. George Lopez, assistant chief of flsheries for Game and Fish, said the die-off cost the state about $44,500. He based that on records of what it costs the state to grow the 86,000 fish, most of which were about 7 inches long.To avoid similar fish kills in the future, Henry said, the state will Iimit the amount of river water allowed mto the hatchery durmg the early spring runoff months and rely more on well and spring flows then.Neary, Ben. "Tests Show Pecos Fish OK to Eat." Albuquerque Journal. 9 May 1991. F12.</text>
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<text>Neary, Ben. "Tests Show Pecos Fish OK to Eat." Albuquerque Journal. 9 May 1991. F12.</text>
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card_8714.xml
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<text>New Mexico Water Quality Control Commission. Water Quality and Water Pollution in New Mexico. Santa Fe: 1988.</text>
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<text>This report has the purpose of being a source of basic information on ground and surface water quality and water pollution control programs in New Mexico.</text>
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<text>BY LAUREN POOLEStaff reporterThe Rio Grande in central New Mexico is relatively clean, but rain-caused runoff carries pollutants into the river, state environmentalists say.In Albuquerque, street runoff is the major problem, bringing high levels of bacteria and floating scum to the river.State environmentalists studied a 33 mile span of the river this summer for four days.The study looked at the river from the diversion dam near the mouth of the Jemez River, downstream to I-25.The type of bacteria often found in the riverΓÇöfecal coliform bacteriaΓÇöusually is not dangerous because it's animal waste, said David Tague, of the state's Surface Water Quality Bureau. But he said he would not recommend drinking the water."A lot of that (bacteria) comes from dog and cat feces from city streets," Tague said.The bacteria level was particularly high near the Alameda bridge, he said.The floating scum found usually comes from detergents and chemicals washing off the streets, said Steve Pierce, also with the state's Surface Water Quality Bureau.Garbage also occasionally reaches the river, he said, when rain washes through arroyos used as dumping sites.Treating runoff from city streets is hard, but cleaning streets more often would help, Tague said.The study also revealed that soil erosion carries metals such as lead, iron and manganese into the river, but none is a threat to aquatic life, he said.North of the study area, dirt and pollutants from rain runoff are captured when they reach Cochiti Reservoir, Tague said.But as the river moves south, it starts picking up sediment again, he said."There's not enough vegetation to hold the soil when it rains," he said.Building lagoons so sediment can settle before reaching the Rio Grande would help, Tague said.Richard Roy, of the state Fish and Wildlife Service, said he recently tested the river for heavy metals and pesticides in the same area."The Rio Grande is pretty clean as far as heavy metals and pesticides are concerned," he said.Fish, birds and other vertebrates are not in danger, he said. Most of the levels found in these animals were not harmful, he said. Poole, Lauren. "River OK Locally, But Don't Drink." Albuquerque Tribune. 15 October 1991. D1.</text>
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<text><span class="style3">oole, Lauren. "River OK Locally, But Don't Drink." Albuquerque Tribune. 15 October 1991. D1.</span></text>
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<text>By KELLY RICHMONDThe New Mexican StaffThe city should begin work immediately on an aggressive program to protect its water wells from the increasing threat of contamination, according to a recent report by a consultant hired to overhaul the city's environmental laws.Lee Wilson and Associates prepared the report as part of its State of the City, a five-part study of Santa Fe's environmental situation. A previously released section dealt with air pollution; a section on odor, heat and glare and another on noise and vibration were released Thursday with the water report; and a final chapter on radiation is expected in a few weeks.Because of extensive state and federal regulations, taking a drink of water "poses much less risk to health than breathing or traveling," the water report says.The report, however, documents numerous cases where Santa Fe ground water, includinx that used for the city water supply, has been contaminated and warns that the potential for such problems is increasing. Two of the eight city wells used by Sangre de Cristo Water Co. to meet Santa Fe's water needs have contamination problems.Nitrate pollution, usually due to leakage from septic tanks or other waste-disposal systems, has been found in water supplies on Agua Fria Road, upper Canyon Road and north of Airport Road; at Sangre de Cristo's Torreon well; and at the site of the city's abandoned wastewater treatment plant on Siler Road, according to the report.The nitrates in Santa Fe's wells approach the level considered to be safe but don't yet exceed that level. Nitrates can cause serious health problems by interfering with the body's ability to absorb oxygen and can be a clue that harder-to-detect forms of contamination also are present, consultant Lee Wilson said.Sangre de Cristo President Phil Soice said his company draws from the Torreon well sparingly because of its high level of nitrates.Pollution from gasoline or solvents leaking from underground storage tanks has contaminated the Sangre de Cristo well north of Baca Street, several sites downtown, and a former Exxon station at the corner of Cerrillos Road and Apache Avenue, according to the report.The Baca Street well, for example, produces water contaminated with benzene, ethylene and other chemicals associated with gasoline, the report states. Sangre de Cristo uses a special filter on water from that well, Soice said.The potential sources for future water pollution include at least 50 and possibly hundreds of businesses that generate small amounts of hazardous waste, hundreds of underground storage tanks, and thousands of septic tanks in the county, hundreds of which are within the city limits.Wilson said he avoided assessing the exact level of the risk of future contamination becanse of a lack of data."But regardless of what risks you assign to these various situations, the conclusion that you draw is that there are lots of potential (water pollution) sources. There are hundreds of them, and you know some of them have caused problems in the past," he said."Whether you think there's a lot of potential for problems in the future or only some potential, the prognosis is definitely one of concern," he said.As with his earlier report on air pollution, Wilson feels the key to preserving the water supply is preventative action by the city."The problem is cleanup tends to be very expensive and difficult; so that's why prevention is getting such a strong emphasis," he said.Because a wellhead protection program would rely heavily on rules limiting or banning potential sources of pollution near wells, "It's something only the city can do," Wilson said."Which is why I emphasize it so much ΓÇö not just because it's so important but because it's a uniquely municipal program .... Either the city does it or it doesn't get done," he said.The city would begin a wellhead protection plan by obtaining hydrologic data around city wells to determine if the state's 1,000-foot protection area is adequate and by conducting a detailed inventory of all potential polluters near the wells.The city would have the authority to then place a variety of controls on possible polluters near wells and could even place a ban on certain land uses, such as gas stations, near the wells, Wilson said."Wellhead protection is one of those programs that if the city wanted to they could have a protection program in place in days or weeks," he said. "It could be refined or expanded over time but it doesn't take a lot to get one started."State money soon could be available for such a program, Wilson said. Albuquerque has three such state-funded positions and the state has allocated more funds for more enforcement."You can put those two facts together and it's reasonable that if the city went after it hard and really demonstrated they were going to adopt a program there's a good chance that those funds would beavailable," he said.Richmond, Kelly. "City Faces Threat of Polluted Water, Consultant Warns." Santa Fe New Mexican. 21 July 1990.</text>
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<text>Richmond, Kelly. "City Faces Threat of Polluted Water, Consultant Warns." Santa Fe New Mexican. 21 July 1990.</text>
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card_10457.xml
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<text>Schad, Theodore M., ed. "Options for Reaching Water Quality Goals." Maryland: American Water Resources Association. 1985.</text>
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<id>2</id>
<text> This volume contains the papers presented at a symposium on the subject "Options for Reaching Water Quality Goals." The papers included are on the following subjects: Institutional and technical aspects of control of pollution from point and nonpoint sources; monitoring for water quality; water quality-quantity relationships; alternative and innovative technology for pollution abatement; prevention and cleanup of contaminated underground aquifers; institutional and technical aspects of controlling ground water pollution; ground water-surface water interrelationships.</text>
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card_10973.xml
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<text>Sheaffer, John R., Leonard A. Stevens. "Future Water." New York: William Morrow and Company, Inc. 1983.</text>
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<content>
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<id>2</id>
<text> The authors claim to have a solution to America's water crisis. They discuss cleaning water, making communities water self-sufficient, and local, state, and national governments working together.</text>
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<script></script>
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card_11265.xml
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<text>United States Department of Energy. "Draft Supplement Environmental Impact Statement Waste Isolation Pilot Plant." Washington D.C.: U.S. Department of Energy. 1989.</text>
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<content>
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<id>2</id>
<text> The purpose of this document is to update the environmental record established on WIPP in 1980 by evaluating the environmental impacts associated with new information, new circumstances, and proposal modifications. The document evaluates and compares the proposed action and two alternatives for demonstrating the safe disposal of transuranic wastes.</text>
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<text>Wilson, David W. "Final Focused Feasability Study Amendment South Valley Hazardous Waste Site." Albuquerque: 1985.</text>
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<content>
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<id>2</id>
<text> This document addresses the severity of the loss of production of San Jose Well Number 6 (South Valley on the cities water system, ways to mitigate problems resulting from the loss, and the impact of these findings.</text>
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<text>By ANNIE WOODSFor the New MexicanESPANOLA ΓÇö The City Council on Tuesday night ordered all homes to be hooked up to the city's water and sewer systems and gave final approval to rate increases for water, sewer and garbage services.The council decided all homes within the city must be hooked up within 30 days and voted to increase from S200 to $800 the cost for a home now equipped with a septic tank and water well to hook up to the city'ssystem.The average residential customer will pay $25.50 for water, sewer and garbage services per month. up $3.30.The extra revenues from the rate increases were built into the city's 1990-91 budget of $11.8 million, which was approved in .lune by the council.Officials argued that requiring all homes to be connected to the city's water and sewer system was necessary to protect ground-water supplies from contamination. Darren Padilla, a representative of the state Environmental Improvement Division. said Espanola has a "very vulnerable ground-water" supply because of the numerous septic tank systems in the area and illegal dumping practices that contaminate ground water.Espanola has several annexed rural areas with private systems not tied to the city's water and sewer system.Mayor Richard Lucero said "the worst (ground-water) contamination in the state of New Mexico is Espanola. The pollution in Espanola is immense. In the long run, the costs of not getting all the people on a city water and sewer system will be much higher (than the rate increase).Four Santo Nino residents said the notice that they must hook up to the city system was too short and added they could not afford the $800 fee.Lucero said those who have a problem paying for hookup could work out a payment plan with the city.Woods, Annie. "Council Orders All Homes In City Hooked Up To Water, Sewer System." Santa Fe New Mexican. 25 July 1990. B1.</text>
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<id>1</id>
<text>Woods, Annie. "Council Orders All Homes In City Hooked Up To Water, Sewer System." Santa Fe New Mexican. 25 July 1990. B1.</text>
