How long will it take before our water is not potable anymore?

[Taverner]

And I'm not talking the risk of a little chemical here and there, but Third World standards, the kind you aren't supposed to drink lest you get giardia?

[NightWatcher]

1. it will always remain "clean", we'll just have to buy it from Nestle

the privatization of municipal sources is underway and disgusting (and criminal) imho

[Taverner]

2. Well yes - but knowing that privatization screws up everything

My guess is we'll pay more, and still have to boil it

[JuniperLea]

4. But corporations are great at self-regulation, right?

My guess is millions of gallons will go out, millions of people will get sick, days, weeks, months will be spent in denial/self-examination by the corporation(s), many will die because this illness was the last straw for them... we'll be told to boil all water, everything will be forgiven.

[Taverner]

6. Sadly yes, that will probably happen

[Brickbat]

3. It isn't in some areas.

[Taverner]

7. Really? I did not know that

What areas have non-potable water?

I know out here there are two lines - reclaimed water (non-potable) for gardening and reservoir water (potable) for drinking

[Brickbat]

8. Some mining communities have water coming from their tap that is undrinkable.

The threads show up regularly here; I think there's one now.

ETA: Here it is: http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=389x9063014

[Taverner]

9. Fuck a Duck...that's scary

And it sounds like you don't want to boil that water either - can't get rid of the chemicals and you might just ignite

[Brickbat]

10. God bless America!

:patriot: :rofl:

[KamaAina]

16. Also, "fracking" for gas drilling has poisoned wells in the interior Northeast.

You can even light some of it on fire! :scared:

[RaleighNCDUer]

12. It's been in the news a lot, lately.

http://www.newsinferno.com/archives/23178

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=389x9063014

Stories of water contamination, warning about benzene in the water table, etc. We are, with 30 years of republican environmental policies, moving into the 3rd world.

[Hell Hath No Fury]

18. Anywhere they do "fracking" --

If you are on a well near fracking your water is undrinkable. You can set fire to it but you can't drink it. There was an excellent HBO documentary called "Gasland" just weeks ago on the subject -- must view work.

On edit:

I would add there are many wells in South Lake Tahoe where my Mom lives that are contaminate with MTBE and had to be shut down.

What you ask about is already happening my friend.

[Taverner]

20. Really sad about Tahoe

Was completely pure before that

[Altoid_Cyclist]

19. This is one article that describes what is going on in the Marcellus Shale Region.

http://spectrum.ieee.org/energy/fossil-fuels/water-and-shale-gas/0

Excerpt:
While it’s true that horizontal drilling sharply reduces an extraction operation’s footprint, in areas where fracking is taking off, its visibility is far from trivial. Visit a place like Dimock, Pa., a town just north of Scranton and just south of Binghamton, N.Y., and you’ll see many large clusters of water tanks; long convoys of big trucks carrying drill pipe, water, and other supplies; compressors, water-sand separators, and other machinery; and drilling derricks, which, at 30 to 50 meters in height, are not tiny. Far more subtle, as Dimock citizen Vera Scroggins points out, are the yellow wires running along the sides of roads to produce seismic readings, vent pipes installed at residential wells to remove methane that has leaked into drinking water, and the tops of plastic-covered semi-subterranean walls that have been installed to prevent chemical-laden surface water from migrating into fields adjacent to drill pads.

http://spectrum.ieee.org/image/1606531
Photo: Louanne McConnell FatoraYuck: Buckeye Creek, in Doddridge County, W.Va., on 29 August 2009. Drilling fluid was dumped into the stream from a nearby site.

http://spectrum.ieee.org/image/1606499
Photo: Tim Shaffer/ReutersCheers: A glass of water, reportedly taken from a Dimock, Penn., well on 7 March 2009, after the start of drilling operations there.

[glinda]

5. Yesterday, we visited my folks in Minneapolis and the facet water smelled like

a combination of chlorine and chems. It was awfully frightening.

[ProgressiveEconomist]

11. Big Pharma/Chem alone is gradually but surely poisoning the water. Whether excreted

after ingestion by humans, animals, or crops, or dumped after being discarded as out of date, where do most of the substances big corporations promote non-stop and sell for trillions of dollars end up?

IMO, we're drinking them, as our wastewater treatment systems have no way of eliminating them or --most often nowadays--even measuring them!

From http://hosted.ap.org/specials/interactives/pharmawater_site/day1_02.html :

"AN AP INVESTIGATION : Pharmaceuticals Found in Drinking Water

Drug traces turn up in source waters for nation's biggest city

By JEFF DONN AP National Writer

NEW YORK (AP) _ ... Research studies have turned up minute amounts of more than 15 drugs or their byproducts in several pristine-looking rivers, a reservoir, and aqueducts feeding the country's biggest water system. Though barely measurable, these pharmaceuticals are present in a variety worthy of a medicine cabinet: drugs for aches, infections, seizures and high blood pressure; hormones for menopause; the active ingredient in a popular sedative; and caffeine _ all bound for the city that never sleeps.

How did they reach waterways? The vast watershed, while mainly rural, stretches almost from Pennsylvania to Connecticut and encompasses lots of human activity. Human and veterinary medicines are excreted or discarded, and eventually enter source waters mostly through residential sewage or farm runoff. And while these waters are processed at wastewater treatment plants upstate, much of the pharmaceutical residue passes right through, studies show. ...

The New York City Department of Environmental Protection, which runs the city's water system, responded to an Associated Press survey of water utilities, saying it has not tested its drinking water for pharmaceuticals, despite the findings in its watershed. The tests that detected pharmaceuticals in the upstate source waters were conducted by the U.S. Geological Survey and New York State Department of Health. ..."

[Better Today]

13. Well it's already happening as mentioned above, but also some places

where they are doing natural gas drilling, the water will ignite. How exciting is that? I'll see if I can find a link.

[Better Today]

14. That didn't take long, here are some links.

http://www.thedenverchannel.com/news/18998652/detail.html
http://www.nydailynews.com/opinions/2010/07/25/2010-07-25_natural_gas_unnatural_risk.html


and a video

http://vimeo.com/4680635

[Selatius]

17. That's rather unsettling. nt

[stuntcat]

15. just wait til the humans start having WARS over water

I have to be here 40 more years, it's one of those low points I know I'll witness. I'm just lucky to be American, us 1st-worlders will have comfortable lives while the poor people suffer more and more :hi:

World Water War, mark my word :P