More than 1 billion people lack access to safe drinking water

More than 1 billion peoplelack access to

safe drinking water

WHY?

Minimata, Japan

Minamata

• Chisso Corporation, in Minamata, Japan– Plastics, drugs, perfumes

• 1920s, dumped waste in Minamata Bay– Cheaper to pay fishermen than properly

dispose of waste

• 1950s: people had numbness, slurred speech, deformed limbs– Animals (cats, birds) died

• 1960s: linked to mercury in fish

Fecal contamination

• Well over 2 million people—mostly children in poor countries—die of diarrhea every year– Almost always a waterborne illness

• Fecal contamination usually detected by testing for E. coli or fecal coliforms

• Usually: NOT pathogenic

Pathogens in water

• Harder to test for than E. coli

• Include organisms that cause:– Cholera– Typhoid fever– Gastroenteritis– Meningitis– hepatitis

Dhaka, Bangladesh

Agriculture

• Pesticides being applied to lettuce in California

• Danger to applicators and many other environmental issues

• Runoff

Groundwater contamination

• About 50% of US population gets drinking water from groundwater– in agricultural areas, that percentage is

HIGHER

• However: more pesticides detected in surface water than in groundwater. WHY?

Pesticides, Denver metro area

cide

Percent detection Maximum concentration (µg/L)

Surface water

Ground water

Surface water

Ground water

Carbaryl 97 0 5.2 < 0.003

Atrazine 86 43 0.2 0.2

Prometon 86 63 0.16 1.4

Diazinon 69 0 0.24 < 0.002

Simazine 64 30 0.048 0.068

DCPA 61 0 0.029 < 0.002

Tebuthiuron 53 17 0.17 0.79

Chlorpyrifos 31 0 0.11 < 0.004

Malathion 25 0 0.089 < 0.005

   Color indicates type of pesticide: Herbicide and Insecticide.

VOCs

Atrazine

• Common herbicide

• Evidence as recently as 2010 that it affects development of ``amphibian gonads’’ frog gender becomes confused

• In agricultural communities, evidence of lowered sperm count among men

Point vs. non-point source