Interstate water disputes are as American as apple pie. States often think a neighboring state is using more than its fair share from a river, lake or aquifer that crosses borders. Currently the U.S. Supreme Court has on its docket a case between Texas, New Mexico and Colorado and another one between Mississippi and Tennessee. The court has already ruled this term on cases pitting Texas against New Mexico and Florida against Georgia. Climate stresses are raising the stakes. Rising temperatures require farmers to use more water to grow the same amount of crops. Prolonged and severe droughts decrease available supplies. Wildfires are burning hotter and lasting…
Category: Uncategorized
Is Romaine Safe to Eat?
Introduction We were delighted as our 12-year-old grandson ordered a Caesar salad when we were having dinner at a pizza place. Vegetables! However, the dinner was December 22, 2019, shortly after CDC and FDA issued yet another warning against eating romaine from Salinas, California. I asked the server where the romaine came from. He didn’t know but went in the back to inquire. He returned and said, “Salinas.” Since 2017, seven outbreaks involving romaine lettuce have sickened hundreds and killed five. Those are the reported numbers. No one knows how many other people got sick. In six outbreaks the lettuce came…
Testing sewage can give school districts, campuses and businesses a heads-up on the spread of COVID-19
November has brought encouraging news about several COVID-19 vaccines. But members of the general public will probably not be vaccinated before the spring or summer of 2021 at the earliest. Americans will be living with this pandemic for some time to come. We are a microbiologist and a water policy specialist, and believe that wastewater-based epidemiology, which tests raw sewage, has an important role to play. Studies have shown that testing wastewater offers an early warning signal that the SARS-CoV-2 virus, which causes COVID-19, is present in a community. Although this approach is less targeted than testing individuals, we believe…
Los Angeles needs to reclaim what we used to consider ‘wastewater’
The city of Los Angeles’ Hyperion Water Reclamation Plant has long symbolized the absurdity of water policy in the American West. Although the plant generates a volume of water equal to the seventh largest river in the United States, until recently, the city of Los Angeles dumped every drop into the Pacific Ocean. Nonsensically, a desert city always in search of water disposes of 190 million gallons a day into the ocean. L.A. is not alone. Most cities do the same thing. Treated sewage and storm water is considered “wastewater,” a substance to get rid of as easily and cheaply…