EPA Releases Searchable Website for Drinking Water Violations / Agency to host webinar to show how to use the public health data
Release date: 05/16/2011 By: Stacy Kika (kika.stacy@epa.gov)
Picture: This picture is of dirty drinking water. Personally, I think this is absolutely gross and disgusting but it is what some drinking water does look like. This is what some organizations are trying to prevent. They want clean water for everyone.
Summary: The EPA (Environmental Protection Agency) has launched a new page on their website dealing with the contaminants in our local water. It is called the Enforcement and Compliance History Online (ECHO) tool. This is something that the EPA is very excited about because it also goes along with President Obama's goal which is to let the people know what information the government collects. ECHO does that by telling us what the government finds out about our drinking water. The EPA feels as if this is information that should be shared because this is something that concerns our health. We need to know if the water we a re drinking is safe and will not damage our health. This new feature met the standards of the Safe Drinking Water Act. The website provides users with information about how clean their drinking water is, any serious violators, and the National Public Water Systems Compliance Report for 2009. The EPA's enforcement goal is to ensure that all of the communities have safe and clean water.
Opinion: I think that it is great that the EPA has decided to let us know how safe the water we drink is. In class today, we learned about different chemicals that could be found in our water that could harm us. These included substances such as Barium, Fluoride, Uranium, and more. We saw that there were many negative impacts if we consumed any of those substances. We need water, and we want to try our best to avoid any chemicals that could harm us. There were a couple that could kill children if it was consumed too much. By having this website, it warns us of any potential harmful substances in our water. Below is a picture taken of the website when you put in Horsham's zip code. When I scrolled down, all of the spaces in the column "Alleged Current Significant Violations" read "no". Our water in the Horsham area is clear and safe for consumption. After all, we do NEED water.
Picture #2: A screenshot of the EPA's ECHO site for Horsham, PA. As you can see, there are no violations.
Questions:
- How much consumption do you think it takes to be harmed by a contaminate in our drinking water?
- If you found out there was a contaminate in our water that could not be gotten rid of right away, what would you do? Why?
- How much water do you think is consumed per day in America?
- How much water do you consume per day? Do you think you should improve that number?
- Do you think that we, as Americans should be drinking more or less water? Or are we drinking a good amount? Why?
I think that ECHO was a great idea and I do not understand why they didn't launch it long ago. Not only do contaminates in our water affect our health they affect the environment around us and that affects the plants and animals that we rely on for food. I also think it is great of the EPA to care so much about the water in everyone's community, I think that this shows that the government does have a soft side ;)
ReplyDeleteTo answer question number 1 if I found out there was a contaminate in the water that we take a while to go away I would start drinking alot more bottled water that came from another state or country, that way I could be sure that it was safe to drink.
A question that I have is, why did it take them so long to create ECHO?
Response to Tals blog
ReplyDeleteSimal Ali October.27.2011
First of all I would like to say, really nice job Tal! It really tied in to class and made good connections! I think the idea of ECHO is a great for the community to know what's goings on with their water supply. I think Present. Obama is right that the citizens should know what information is being colleted by the government. It's great that there are no violations with the horsham area, but this makes me wonder if there were, what type of things could cause them. I know today in class we were talking about how when you are trying to determine the what type of contaminates would you likely find I. A specific area you should look into what activities occur in it. For example if I was trying to figure out what contaminates,if there were any, would we find In the Hatboro-Horsham area, nitrite and nitrate seemed to be the best fits in this case. The process I used to determine that was by look to see if any source of contaminates took place I. This area, and they were the closest match.On a much more serious note I know this would be a helpful thing to have because there are quite a few contaminates that do cause death to children, which is a something we should really try to avoid.
To answer one of Tal's questions about how much water do I think I drink in a day, I always try to drink my 8 cups a day but some days it works around that number sometimes a bit less and sometimes a bit more. I'm glad to know my water is safe and healthy for my family to use.
Questions of my own:
1. How many contaminates can be consumed before severe damage is done to humans health?
2. What are a few ways contaminates can be gotten rid of?
3. Where are a few places that have contaminated water?
I think that the ECHO is such a great tool so that different community members can check to see if their water is safe for them and their family to drink. I agree with Bri that this should have been launched a while ago to inform everyone of the contaminates in the water around their towns. The only reason I could think of for delaying the launch was technology restrictions. I also agree with Tal when she sadi that the drinking water in the picture is disgusting! Although many people have to drink that kind of water due to droughts, over use, etc.
ReplyDeleteTo answer Tals question, "How much consumption do you think it takes to be harmed by a contaminate in our drinking water?" I think it all depends on how much there is in the water according to ppm's and ppb's. Anything above that number would be harmful to anyone, but I think if there is a higher ppm/ppb then only a few glasses or bottles of water could harm a person. If the number is lower than it would take longer for the body to react or show symptoms.
Some question or my own are:
1. At any point in time has there been a water violation in Horsham?
These advancements from the EPA are great and help our community know what is really in our drinking water. I agree with sarah bri tal and simal when they say that this is a great tool, but should have been launched awhile ago. Our community is not really educated when it comes to the purity of our water. We seem to play dumb and act like we dont know what pollutants are in our drinking water because the answers may scare us, and we don't know what to do about it.
ReplyDeleteTo answer tals question, "Do you think that we, as Americans should be drinking more or less water? Or are we drinking a good amount? Why?" i would say that the amount of water we drink is necessarily for living comfortibly, but we need to watch the amount of water we waste. The excess water wasted would save lives elsewhere in the world.
question- Are there any other programs started by the EPA
Do you think America will take this info into consideration when looking into the water crisis?
How long do you think our planet could support humans with the amount of water we have?