contaminated water

Waters at Risk? EPA Will Revoke the Clean Waters Act of 1972

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), under the direction of the Trump administration, will revoke a rule that gives the agency broad authority over regulating the pollution of tributaries and wetlands that flow into the country’s largest rivers. [1]
EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt told Congress on June 27, 2017, that the agency would “provide clarity” by “withdrawing” the rule, and follow standards set in 2008. Pruitt had previously said he would recuse himself from working on litigation to the rule.
Said Pruitt:

Fukushima Radiation Detected on U.S. West Coast

Seaborne radiation from Japan’s Fukushima nuclear disaster has been detected in seawater samples taken from Tillamook Bay and Gold Beach in Oregon, researchers from the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution have announced. [1]
Source: International Business Times
The institution’s chemical oceanographer, Ken Buesseler, has been tracking the radiation plume in a crowdfunded effort “to monitor the ongoing spread of radiation across the Pacific and its evolving impacts on the ocean,” the institution’s website states.

200 Millions Americans Threatened by Toxic Levels of Carcinogenic Chemical in Tap Water

In 1993, Erin Brockovich was a key player in the case against Pacific Gas and Electric when it was found to be polluting the water of Hinckley, California with chromium-6, a carcinogenic chemical. Now, a new report by the Environmental Working Group has found that the chemical is actually still in the drinking water, threatening 218 million Americans.
Source: EWG

Could Contaminated Water Have Caused Legionnaires Outbreaks in Flint, Michigan?

Two outbreaks of Legionnaires disease in and around Flint, Michigan, have health officials looking into whether they were caused or at least affected by the ongoing water-contamination problem going on in that city.
The Michigan Department of Health and Human Services is investigating the outbreaks, in 2014 and 2015, which sickened 87 people and killed 10 in Genesee County. The sick ranged in age from 26 to 94, and fell ill between either June 6, 2014, to March 9, 2015, or May 4, 2015, to Oct. 29, 2015, the agency said.