Contaminants in 20 Percent of U.S. Private Wells
More than 20 percent of private domestic wells sampled across the nation contain at least one contaminant at levels of potential health concern. About 43 million people — or 15 percent of the Nation’s population — use drinking water from private wells, which are not regulated by the Federal Safe Drinking Water Act. USGS scientists sampled about 2,100 private wells in 48 states and found that the contaminants most frequently measured at concentrations of potential health concern were inorganic contaminants, including radon and arsenic. These contaminants are mostly derived from the natural geologic materials that make up the aquifers from which well water is drawn. Complete findings are available at http://water.usgs.gov/nawqa/studies/domestic_wells/. For more information, listen to a podcast interview with USGS scientist Leslie DeSimone on this report at Contamination in U.S. Private Wells or contact Leslie at ldesimon@usgs.gov or (508) 490-5023.
Beltzville State Park Programs
Spring Clean Up at Beltzville State Park!
Saturday, April 18
Meet at Environmental Interpretive Center (EIC)
Spring Clean-up Day is an excellent way to give something back to Beltzville State Park by lending a hand in getting ready for the summer. Join us for the entire morning or just for a portion of it! Bring your family for an hour or two! Celebrate Earth Day and The Great PA Cleanup! Great for families, scouts, community service & more!
Earth Day began on April 22, 1970.
*Earth Day Park Cleanup 9:30 am—1 pm
Join other DCNR Conservation Volunteers, as we spruce up Beltzville’s Native plant Butterfly garden and surrounding area. Volunteer “jobs” include planting, mulching, weeding, and more! If enough participants & groups register, we will be working on trails & litter cleanup too! Volunteers will be asked to work on small and large clean-up projects and will be assigned to projects based on their skills, abilities and desires. Wear comfortable clothing, sturdy footwear, leather/canvas gloves (if you have them), and bring a snack & a drink.
***MORE VOLUNTEER OPPORTUNITIES:
Beltzville’s Maintenance staff has been working hard on the Park’s trails. We are plagued with invasive plants such as Tartarian honeysuckle, Autumn Olive, Russian Olive & Multi-flora rose that grow at an exponential rate. We used a plant eating machine (not the technical term!) to clear a lot of trails. Beyond our needs for April 18, we also need help removing branches from the cleared trails (Trinity Gorge and Preacher’s Camp trail).
We also have litter to clean up. Pohopoco Drive is in serious need of help. If you need community service or would just like to be outside, please call us!
In PURSUIT of AMPHIBIANS
Friday, May 1
5:30 pm – 7:30 pm @ EIC
What’s that melodic sound coming from your local wetland? Join Carissa Reilly-Longo on our annual hunt for frogs, toads & salamanders at wetland locations within the Park. Hear the resounding Spring Peeper
chorus at the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Spillway area. Program will start in the EIC with an introduction to amphibian ID and frog calls. Dress to get muddy & bring waders/water shoes if you have them! Families are welcome! Please register.
Registration is necessary. You may register online, via email or phone.
Beltzville State Park
2950 Pohopoco Drive
Lehighton, PA 18235-8905
610.377.9150 fax: 610.377.9439
E-mail: RA-nrspBeltEnvEd@state.pa.us
www.dcnr.state.pa.us OR www.visitPAparks.com
Lehigh Gap Nature Center
There are lots of great events and volunteer opportunities at Lehigh Gap Nature Center this spring. Here is a listing of the events for the next 6 weeks so you can get them on your calendar and plan on attending some of the sessions. PLEASE NOTE — the May 24 bird walk was listed as May 23 (in error) in the Calendar of Events sent out earlier. The bird walk is on Sunday, May 24.
College of Ag Sciences 2009 summer camp takes students to the swamp
Monday, March 30, 2009
Penn State’s Stone Valley Recreation Area may sound like your typical summer camp, with fields, forests and streams, but students attending the annual College of Agricultural Sciences Conservation Leadership School will gain a lot more than sun and fun.
The Conservation Leadership School has been offering students the chance to increase their awareness of environmental conservation for more than 50 years.
Welcome to the Online Home of the Carbon County Groundwater Guardians
We were founded in 1999 to provide education on private wells, 
water and septic systems. As a 501(c)(3) nonprofit, volunteer organization, all our programs are designed to help homeowners with questions or problems and provide education to adults and students. For more information click ABOUT.
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Free lead screening coming to Carbon
From the Lehighton Times News
March 17, 2009
Program is one of many that is coming to Children’s Fun-N-Safety fair
By AMY ZUBEK azubek@tnonline.com
A free lead screening program is coming to Carbon County.
On May 2, during the third annual Children’s Fun-N-Safety Fair, children and pregnant or lactating women will have the opportunity to get screened to see if they have been exposed to lead. The fair will run from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. at the Carbon Masonic Lodge, located at Fifth and Center streets in Jim Thorpe.
Read more
New Electronic Gadgets Galore! But what should you do with the Old Stuff?
EPA News Release (Region 3):
Contact: Donna Heron, 215-814-5113 or heron.donna@epa.gov
PHILADELPHIA (February 26, 2009) — The holidays are behind us and gifts of new electronic devices ranging from cell phones to televisions are making us smile. This year as broadcast television switches to an all digital broadcast format, TVs were at the top of many gift lists. Now what do you do with those old electronics?
"Clean Coal" Legacy of Pollution Starts Even Before it's Burned
This is a Press Release from The Center for Public Integrity and we are publishing it for you information. We would like to know what you think about this issue.
The Center for Public Integrity
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
CONTACT: Steve Carpinelli (202) 481-1225
Center for Public Integrity Investigation Exposes Environmental Consequences of Longwall Coal Mining
WASHINGTON, D.C., January 12, 2009 — Longwall mining is a highly productive underground process employed to quickly and cheaply extract coal, but the practice comes with a steep environmental price, as documented in a year-long investigation by the Center for Public Integrity, “The Hidden Costs of “Clean Coal.” As Congress and the incoming Obama administration contemplate alternatives to fossil fuels, the Center has turned a spotlight on a devastating mining method that most Americans outside northern Appalachia have never heard of.
Longwall mines produced 176 million tons of coal in 2007 — 15 percent of total U.S. production, according to the federal Energy Information Administration. An estimated 10 percent of all U.S. electricity now depends on coal from longwall mining, which has grown over the years in Appalachia and in the states of Illinois, Utah, Colorado, and New Mexico.
The Center’s newly released project, The Hidden Costs of “Clean Coal,” features a multimedia website with two magazine articles (“The Big Seep” and “Undermined”) a narrated video, a podcast, a document library, and a slideshow which offers a rare glimpse inside one of the country’s largest longwall mines.
“The environment and residents along the Appalachian corridor are suffering the consequences of longwall mining’s extraction methods,” said Center Executive Director Bill Buzenberg. “Weak government oversight has failed to account for the damage done and has left citizens virtually powerless to undo the harm.”
Concentrated primarily in southwestern Pennsylvania and northern Appalachia, longwall mining dramatically rearranges the earth’s landscape. The process involves hulking steel shearers that wind their way beneath landowners’ homes, slicing off entire coal seams hundreds of feet below ground and leaving in its wake caverns up to five feet tall. The consequent shock waves cause severe damage to structures, deplete water resources, and disrupt wildlife.
The Center’s first story, “Undermined,” exposes the David-versus-Goliath battles that have defined southwestern Pennsylvania, where six of the country’s top 25 longwall mines snake below 138,743 acres of rural terrain — 15 percent of the region. The piece underscores the difficult and prolonged battle that landowners face, fighting not only “Big Coal,” with its legal tactics and political sway, but indifferent state officials. By September 2008, 1,819 Pennsylvania property owners had reported longwall damages since the state began documenting such complaints.
The second article, “The Big Seep,” examines longwall mining’s crippling environmental legacy: dried up streams. Scientists have found that the impact of longwall mining has permanently lowered the region’s water table, while farmers have been hit hard by disappearing agricultural land. In 2000, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service found in field investigations that out of 131 tributaries undermined by the longwall machine, more than half had either been drained or damned up.
While longwall mining continues unabated, the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection has failed to document the extensive structural damages to homes and vanishing water sources, the investigation found. While the DEP is required by law to assess the mining’s damages every five years, past agency studies have been criticized for their lack of data.
The Hidden Costs of “Clean Coal” is generously supported by a grant from The Heinz Endowments. In addition, organizational support for the Center is provided by Carnegie Corporation of New York, the Ford Foundation, the JEHT Foundation, the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, the Park Foundation, the Rockefeller Brothers Fund, and other generous institutional and individual donors.
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The Center for Public Integrity is a nonprofit, nonpartisan and independent digital news organization specializing in investigative journalism and research on significant public policy issues. Since 1990, the Washington, D.C.-based Center has released more than 475 investigative reports and 17 books to provide greater transparency and accountability of government and other institutions. It has received the prestigious George Polk Award and more than 32 other national journalism awards and 18 finalist nominations from national organizations, including PEN USA, Investigative Reporters and Editors, Society of Environmental Journalists, and National Press Foundation. In 2007, the Society of Professional Journalists recognized three Center projects with first-place online awards — the only organization that year to be recognized with three awards. The Center has been honored with the Online News Association’s coveted General Excellence Award, and a special citation for the body of its investigative work from the Shorenstein Center on the Press, Politics and Public Policy at Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government. www.publicintegrity.org
DEP Web Site Lists Electronics, TV Recycling Collections
HARRISBURG (Dec. 30) — With new televisions being a popular gift during at the holidays, many families are looking for environmentally correct ways to get rid of their old TVs.
The Department of Environmental Protection urges residents to recycle their electronic discards, including televisions, rather than disposing of them in the trash. If the electronics are working, finding someone who can use them is an even better option.
DEP maintains a listing of electronics collection events and sites on its Web site at http://www.depweb.state.pa.us, then search for “Electronics Collection Programs.” More information is available by calling DEP’s toll-free Household Hazardous Waste hot line at 800-346-4242 or DEP’s Division of Waste Minimization and Planning at 717-787-7382.
Though it is legal to dispose of electronics in the trash in Pennsylvania, disposal can be detrimental to the environment. Electronic equipment contains heavy metals that, if not properly managed or contained, can become hazardous wastes.
The DEP reminds residents that it is not necessary to discard of a working television in order to receive programming following the national switch to digital broadcasting Feb. 19. Customers who receive their signal over cable or satellite will not need to take any action. Those who receive the signal with antennas need only get a digital converter box. For more information, visit the Federal Communications Commission at http://www.dtv.gov.
Arsenic linked to cardiovascular disease at EPA-regulated drinking water standards
Public release date: 13-Nov-2008
Contact: Clare Collins
CollCX@upmc.edu
412-647-3555
University of Pittsburgh Schools of the Health Sciences
University of Pittsburgh mouse study published in Journal of Clinical Investigations
PITTSBURGH, Nov. 13 – When mice are exposed to arsenic at federally-approved levels for drinking water, pores in liver blood vessels close, potentially leading to cardiovascular disease, say University of Pittsburgh researchers in the Dec. 1 issue of the Journal of Clinical Investigation, available online Nov. 13. The study, while preliminary, also reveals how an enzyme linked to hypertension and atherosclerosis alters cells, and may call into question current Environmental Protection Agency standards that are based solely on risks for cancer.
In the study, Aaron Barchowsky, Ph.D., associate professor of environmental and occupational health at the University of Pittsburgh Graduate School of Public Health, and his research team looked at specialized cells in the liver called sinusoidal endothelial cells, which are tasked with removing wastes from blood and enabling nutrients to regulate metabolism. After exposing mice to 10 to 100 parts per billion (ppb) of arsenic over a two-week period, the cells were less able to remove damaged proteins from the blood and lost their characteristic pores or “windows,” severely compromising the cells’ ability to effectively exchange nutrients and waste. Dr. Barchowsky notes that despite their small size, mice are usually less sensitive to the effects of arsenic than people
The current EPA standard for arsenic in public water systems is 10 ppb, reduced from 50 ppb in 2006. The standard applies only to drinking water sources that serve more than 20 people.
“These results are important since this type of cellular dysfunction, over time, can impair the body’s ability to clear fats and waste proteins that build up in blood vessels and can lead to cardiovascular diseases such as hypertension and atherosclerosis,” said Dr. Barchowsky
According to Dr. Barchowsky, arsenic increased the activity of an enzyme called NADPH oxidase and the levels of oxidants it produces, compromising sinusoidal cell functions. Mice that lacked the enzyme did not have changes in liver blood vessels when exposed to arsenic and their cells were able to continue to function effectively.
“Our findings raise some concerns about whether current EPA-developed standards can effectively protect against cardiovascular risks posed by arsenic in drinking water,” said Dr. Barchowsky. “We are especially concerned about water from individual wells in small, rural and semi-rural communities that are exempt from the EPA requirement and often contain levels of arsenic that exceed the EPA limit.
Next phases of the research will focus on further understanding how arsenic increases the production of oxidants by NADPH oxidase and determining effective preventative measures to lessen the impact of arsenic and other environmental exposures on the function of the endothelial cells. Additional studies will investigate the relationship between arsenic’s effects on liver blood vessels and metabolism and disease-related changes in other blood vessels in the body.
Arsenic is a naturally occurring mineral primarily found in groundwater. Drinking high levels of arsenic over many years has been linked to increased risks for lung, bladder and skin cancers, as well as heart disease, diabetes and neurological damage.
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The study was funded by the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences, the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute, the Environmental Protection Agency and the University of Pittsburgh. Co-authors include Adam Straub, Ph.D., Katherine Clark, Mark Ross, Ashwin Chandra, Song Li, M.D., Ph.D., Xiang Gao, Ph.D., Patrick Pagano, Ph.D., and Donna Stolz, Ph.D., all with the University of Pittsburgh.