High E. Coli Levels Linked to Crumbling Manholes
Dec. 1--Macomb County is unleashing an ambitious attack on dangerous E. coli levels found in waterways this year by repairing more than 1,000 exposed manholes that are drawing in contaminated water that is polluting rivers and Lake St. Clair. Some of the highest E. coli levels ever recorded in the county were found at beaches in St. Clair Shores this summer. The idea is to stop storm water from entering the already-overtaxed sanitary sewer system.
Source:
Detroit Free Press
Farmers Hoping for Snow to Help Irrigation Allotment
Dec. 1--LAS CRUCES -- Though the growing season for most Dona Ana County farmers is still an entire season away, one question is already on the minds of plenty of growers. The answer hinges on two factors: how much water is in Elephant Butte Lake and Caballo Reservoir right now and how much snowfall over the course of the next few months will increase those water levels come spring. Some 591,400 acre-feet of water, or 30 percent of capacity, sat in Elephant Butte last Tuesday, roughly 248,300 acre-feet more than one year ago, according to the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation.
Source:
Las Cruces Sun-News
Metropolis Hopes to Keep Water Treatment Plant Afloat
Dec. 1--METROPOLIS, Ill. -- Waste water is a certainty. Consequently, so are Environmental Protection Agency regulations to deal with the inevitable used water. Those two realities are proving a bit costly for the City of Metropolis as it moves along to meet EPA standards by upgrading its aging waste water treatment plant.
Source:
The Paducah Sun
Delaware River Plan to Draw Further Review
Nov. 26--After a torrent of objections from the public, a plan to manage the flow of the Delaware River -- the latest in a half-century's worth of wrestling matches among four states, the federal government, and others -- is headed for review. The plan is an attempt to balance the needs of a bigfoot -- New York City, with its withdrawals of drinking water and its reserve supplies in three headwaters reservoirs -- against those of the Philadelphia region and elsewhere. Legal complexities meant it had not been formally adopted by the Delaware River Basin Commission, the agency that manages the river's flows.
Source:
The Philadelphia Inquirer
Overflowing With Efficiency: Chatham House is First to Meet Standards for WaterSense Program
Nov. 26--CHAPEL HILL -- A new house in Chatham County that uses innovative water-saving appliances and construction design was recognized Tuesday by federal environmental leaders as the nation's first to meet standards of a new program promoting water efficiency. "Water is a resource we're going to have to preserve," said Kip Guyon, president of Vanguard Homes, which built the home. The house's water-efficient design meets the voluntary specifications to be certified as a WaterSense home.
Source:
The News & Observer
NASA Works Kinks Out of Water Recycler, Solar-Panel Joint
Nov. 26--CAPE CANAVERAL After days of laboriously cleaning and tinkering with vital systems aboard the international space station, astronauts appear to have fixed a troublesome new water-recycling machine and a cranky mechanical joint that keeps solar panels facing the sun. It will be weeks before NASA declares success, but it looks as if four spacewalks outside the station to clean and lubricate the starboard Solar Alpha Rotary Joint, and painstaking efforts inside to get the water treatment unit up and running, have paid off.
Source:
The Orlando Sentinel
Litter Trashes Activity on Oklahoma City Rivers and Lakes
Dec. 1--Careless litter is certainly not a problem that is unique to Oklahoma City. But people who use the city's waterways would probably appreciate it if more discarded water bottles and burger wrappers made it to a trashcan instead of a gutter. Now more than ever, especially on the Oklahoma River, the city's bodies of water are becoming central to the area's outdoor activity options.
Source:
The Daily Oklahoman
City of Belpre, Ohio to Save Millions from Energy, Water Efficiency Improvements
BELPRE, Ohio, Nov. 25 /PRNewswire/ -- The City of Belpre, Ohio, announced today the completion of a two-year-long comprehensive energy conservation and facilities improvement program, which will result in yearly savings and enhanced revenues of nearly $306,836 over the next decade. The improvements to the City's facilities were completed by Ameresco, Inc., of Framingham, Mass., North America's largest independent energy solutions company. Improvements made during the program include renovation of the city's aging water treatment plant, energy efficiency upgrades to city facilities and installation of the area's only municipal solar panels, which cover 73% of the electricity needs of Belpre's Municipal Building.
Source:
PRNewswire
Scientists to Further Collaborate on Climate Change and Water Cycles
Scientists to further collaborate on climate change and water cycles BEIJING, Nov. 24 (Xinhua) -- Around 70 scientists and scholars from China and Europe, mainly the United Kingdom, gathered in Beijing Monday to exchange opinions on climate change and its impacts on global and regional water resources. Entitled "Climate Change and the Role of the Water Cycle", the seminar is co-organized by the Research Councils UK (RCUK), the Monsoon Asia Integrated Regional Study (MAIRS), and the EU funded integrated project Water and Global Change (WATCH) with an aim to enhance collaborations between Chinese and European scientists on climate change and water cycles.
Source:
Xinhua News Agency - CEIS
One-third of China's Yellow River polluted
BEIJING - Newly released scientific results show one-third of the famed Yellow River, which supplies water to millions of people in northern China, is heavily polluted by industrial waste and unsafe for any use. The Yellow River, the second-longest in China, has seen its water quality deteriorate rapidly in the last few years, as discharge from factories increases and water levels drop because of diversion for booming cities. The results showed pollution has gotten slightly worse since 2006, when 31 percent of the water in the river was poorer than a level 5, according to an earlier survey.
Source:
Associated Press/AP Online
Coalition Plan Would Protect Nissequogue Watershed
Nov. 25--Standing atop a riverside dam at Sunken Meadow State Park, a coalition of officials, environmental advocates and citizens announced an ambitious blueprint yesterday for protecting the Nissequogue River watershed. From planting eelgrass beds to reducing pollution from local septic systems, the report laid out 110 concrete goals to improve water quality, conserve habitat and enhance recreation in the 40-square-mile area that drains into the river. "The Nissequogue watershed is critically important to the health of Long Island Sound," said state Assemb.
Source:
Newsday, Melville, N.Y.
California Bulks Up Defenses Against Tide of Global Warming
Nov. 24--California is building a second line of defense against global warming, one that will prepare the state for a harsher environment while the other continues to cut climate-changing emissions. The two-front approach acknowledges that rising sea levels, bigger floods, greater loss of species and other harsh effects of warming are inevitable, if not already occurring -- no matter the state's success in slashing greenhouse gases. On Nov. 14, Schwarzenegger issued an executive order to identify the state's biggest vulnerabilities to rising sea levels and draft an "adaptation strategy."
Source:
The Sacramento Bee
Delta Vision Plan Recommendations
The "Delta Vision Strategic Plan" released last month calls for a complete overhaul of the way the Delta -- the West Coast's largest estuary and a source of water for 25 million Californians -- is managed. Developed by a panel appointed by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, the proposal addresses water deliveries, the environment, the local economy, state water policies and overall management. Those actions include information gathering, installing a new fish protection screen at the forebay that serves state pumps and stockpiling rock and other emergency response materials around the Delta to be ready in case of a levee break.
Source:
Oakland Tribune
Astronauts tinker with urine-to-water machine
HOUSTON - Astronauts tinkered Sunday with a troublesome piece of equipment designed to help convert urine and sweat into drinkable water, which is vital to allowing the international space station crew to double to six. Station commander Michael Fincke and space shuttle Endeavour astronaut Donald Pettit changed how a centrifuge is mounted in a urine processor, which is part of the newly delivered $154 million water recovery system. The centrifuge is a spinning device that helps separate the water from urine.
Source:
Associated Press/AP Online
Trout Back in Cool Water of Illinois
VINCE KENNON held out his hand and showed how his limbs have been shaking with anticipation. "I've been like this since June," he said. Thursday afternoon he stood behind the idling Oklahoma Department of Wildlife Conservation's hatchery truck near the banks of the Lower Illinois River.
Source:
Tulsa World
Zimbabwe's Second City Runs Out of Water Treatment Chemicals
Text of report by South Africa-based ZimOnline website on 25 November BULAWAYO -Zimbabwe's second largest city said on Monday it had less than a month's supply of water treatment chemicals, as cholera ravages the crisis-ridden country while South Africa called for urgent action to prevent the total collapse of its northern neighbour. Bulawayo mayor Thabiso Moyo told ZimOnline that an acute shortage of foreign currency has left the city of more than one million people unable to secure enough water treatment chemicals.
Source:
BBC Monitoring Africa
Membrane Technology Provides Solutions for the Imminent Water Crisis in South Africa
CAPE TOWN, South Africa, Nov 24 /PRNewswire/ -- The demand for membranes in South Africa is set to increase as effluent discharge policies are enforced more stringently and water supply pressures become more apparent. Although membrane technology currently requires high capital and operating expenditure, with improvements in technologies water membrane treatment costs are anticipated to continue declining, which will drive demand. New analysis from Frost & Sullivan (http://www.environmental.frost.com/), South African Membrane Market, finds that the market earned revenues of $37.5 million in 2007 and estimates this to more than triple by 2014 to reach $143.9 million.
Source:
PRNewswire
Lynnhaven River's Oysters May Be Up, but Grades Down
Nov. 21--VIRGINIA BEACH -- The Lynnhaven River is having a great environmental year, right? After all, because of healthier conditions, 112 more acres of the Virginia Beach waterway have been opened to shellfish harvesting, bucking a statewide trend and adding to the promise of cleaner water and a resurgent Lynnhaven oyster industry. But a report released Thursday night by Lynnhaven River Now, an environmental group, concludes that the city's largest river system slightly worsened ecologically in 2008.
Source:
The Virginian-Pilot
Trash Rates Rise, Water Costs Expected to Follow
COVINA - Residents will be asked to grab for their pocketbooks to pay for increased trash rates, and higher water costs are expected to follow. The City Council unanimously approved a 6 percent rise in trash rates for Athens Services. Next month the council will consider hiking water rates throughout the community of 47,850.
Source:
Whittier Daily News
Cleanup System Organized to Counteract Excess Nutrients from Geese
There they were, lingering on the periphery of the unveiling of a new day in storm-water filtration. They are the reason the city used this one-tenth of an acre in the shadow of Mount Trashmore as a site for a new storm-water filtration system. The new system, called Bacterra, lowers the bacteria content by 94 percent and nutrients such as phosphorus that are harmful to waterways by 73 percent, according to the Virginia company, Americast, that makes the system.
Source:
Virginian - Pilot
MAWC Approves $17M in Improvements for the System's Aging Water Lines
$8.7 million to install water lines between South Greensburg and Hempfield; and $4 million to replace century-old water lines in the New Stanton area. Each project is a replacement of existing water lines and will not immediately lead to new customers for the authority, which provides water to more than 120,000 customers in five counties.
Source:
Tribune-Review
Long Island's Village of Babylon Taking Steps to Reduce Stormwater Pollution
Nov. 20--In what Suffolk officials call Long Island's most extensive municipal effort to reduce storm water pollution, the Village of Babylon plans to install filters at every village outfall pipe that leads to the Great South Bay. The plan addresses one of Long Island's biggest water quality problems: contaminated runoff from heavy rains that washes oil, chemicals and animal waste off the land and into creeks and bays. Citing Babylon's history of fishing and clamming on the Great South Bay, Scordino said, "It's our duty to make sure that asset and that resource is here for our children, and our children's children."
Source:
Newsday, Melville, N.Y.
Hefty Rate Increases Are Recommended in Coming Years
Nov. 20--Kansas City residents will face much higher sewer rates in coming years, but city officials also will seek federal funding and try to provide relief to low-income households. Those are among the conclusions of a task force that has met for months to discuss how the city can afford a $2.4 billion sewer overhaul program. The group Wednesday put the finishing touches on its strategies to pay for the city's largest-ever public works project.
Source:
The Kansas City Star (Kansas City, Missouri)
No Local Water, Sewer Rate Increases Planned
Nov. 20--Water authorities in Jacksonville and Oxford say they are not planning a water and sewer rate increase, following a rate hike by Anniston and rural Calhoun County's water board. The Calhoun County Water Authority in November raised its minimum rate per month and increased overall rates by 4 percent. Calhoun County Water Authority General Manager Roger Hall said the increase will pay for the authority's capital projects.
Source:
The Anniston Star
Report Lists Environmental Progress
A new report has been released that describes EPAâs environmental and financial progress over the past year.
Source:
Water Environment Federation
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