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Why this Matters: Groundwater contamination affects communities across the country. In Orange County and Oakland, California groundwater polluted with industrial waste is seeping into sources of drinking water. It’s not just factories: fracking is also a major contributor to groundwater pollution. In February, the governors of Pennsylvania, New York, New Jersey, and Delawarevoted unanimously to ban fracking in the Delaware River Basin in order to make its water safer to drink. Perhaps this case bodes well for enforcing our clean water laws to prevent industrial production from polluting more groundwater.
Mountaire Corp is the sixth largest chicken company in the U.S., with plants in Arkansas, Maryland, Virginia, and North Carolina. Its Millsboro plant slaughters about two million chickens a week, and normally treats two million gallons of wastewater a day, and then sends it to lined lagoons and sprays it on thirteen fields. As a result, Montaire will have to spend $140 million to upgrade its treatment system, which had failed in 2017 due to an increase in production. This 2017 failure caused the lion’s share of its groundwater pollution. In addition, Mountaire Corp. will have to put aside $65 million to pay for residents whose properties were damaged by its plant.
Phillip Plylar, president of Mountaire, said in a statement:“… We’re ready to put this chapter behind us and forge a new relationship with our neighbors moving forward.” But for the residents who have been affected by Mountaire’s irresponsible pollution, the damage has already been done. One resident, Larry Miller, believes that this contaminated water caused the loss of his mother in 2007 and his wife in 2013, to kidney cancer. He told the Washington Post: “I wish we had known then. We would have quit drinking the water or complained about what they were doing.”
By Ashira Morris, ODP Staff Writer For decades, uranium mining has contaminated the Navajo Nation, causing higher cancer rates and water pollution. Even though the health risks and environmental harms of uranium mining are well-established, new operations continue to move forward. One local group, the Eastern Navajo Diné Against Uranium Mining (ENDAUM) hasn’t found a […]
By Natasha Lasky, ODP Staff Writer California Governor Gavin Newsom announced that he would extend the drought emergency statewide and issued an executive order to have residents conserve water. As part of this effort, eight new counties were added to the state of emergency, and authorized the State Water Resources Control Board was authorized to […]
By Elizabeth Love, ODP Contributing Writer Authorities in the Canadian Arctic territory Nunavut, announced a state of emergency this week due to a possible contamination event affecting the City of Iqaluit’s water supply. Tests were performed after residents reported the smell of gasoline coming from their tap water, but they came back clean. However, […]
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