Day: September 16, 2024

U.S. senators from #Kansas, #Colorado, #Arizona introduce bill to unlock funds for water preservation — Kansas Reflector

U.S. Sen. Jerry Moran says Kansas communities, farmers and businesses have been impacted by widespread drought. (Sherman Smith/Kansas Reflector)

Click the link to read the article on the Kansas Reflector website (Allison Kite):

September 12, 2024

States, Native American tribes and local communities could get help accessing federal funds for water infrastructure projects in drought-stricken areas under new U.S. Senate legislation.

The Water Project Navigators Act — sponsored by U.S. Sens. Jerry Moran and John Hickenlooper and Reps. Brittany Pettersen and Juan Ciscomani — would create a program in the Bureau of Reclamation to place “navigator” positions in local, state and tribal communities. Navigators would help connect communities to resources.

In a news release announcing the legislation, Moran, a Kansas Republican, said federal resources to help preserve water can be difficult to access.

“Widespread drought is impacting many communities across Kansas, hurting family farms, local municipalities and businesses,” Moran said.

Hickenlooper, a Colorado Democrat, said the same.

“Rural and Tribal communities deserve their fair share of federal funds to address drought, but all too often are left out,” Hickenlooper said.

Fellow Coloradoan Pettersen said water scarcity is felt throughout Colorado, but rural communities struggle to respond.

“It is critical that we invest in these areas to strengthen and protect our water resources and help communities draw down federal dollars,” Pettersen said.

Kansas and Colorado — along with Ciscomani’s home state of Arizona — struggle with continual drought and limited access to water. As of last week, according to the U.S. Drought Monitor, more than 51% of Kansas is in some level of drought, mostly moderate or severe. Almost 5% of Arizona is in extreme drought. Colorado is currently the least affected with about 12% of the state in some level of drought.

“In Arizona, water is our most precious resource,” said Ciscomani, a Republican. “As the drought worsens in the West, it is now more important than ever that impacted communities have the necessary tools to secure federal dollars for critical multi-benefit water infrastructure projects.” 

The legislation is backed by conservation groups, according to the news release, along with the Kansas Water Office, Kansas Department of Health and Environment and the Kansas Department of Agriculture.

You’ve probably never heard of this ‘forever chemical.’ Scientists say it’s everywhere — E&E News #PFAS

Click the link to read the article on the E&E News website (Miranda Willson). Here’s an excerpt:

September 12, 2024

“It’s absolutely everywhere,” said Sarah Hale, an environmental researcher who manages ZeroPM, a project funded by the European Union. “Trifluoroacetic acid (TFA) will be the next discussion in America, I can guarantee it. It will be about how should we treat it and what should we do.”

The attention on TFA underscores the game of whack-a-mole that scientists and communities face with forever chemicals. With thousands of identified versions of the substances, the chemicals are practically ubiquitous in the global economy, and researchers are still determining the exact health risks associated with many of them. But TFA could pose a particularly difficult problem down the line, due to how much it would cost to take it out of drinking water, experts say. The substance is extremely small, mobile and water soluble. As a result, it cannot be removed from water using the filtration systems that many communities are installing now for large, widely studied forever chemicals, said Rainer Lohmann, a professor of oceanography at the University of Rhode Island.

Click the link to access the article “Assessing the environmental occurrence of the anthropogenic contaminant trifluoroacetic acid (TFA)” on the Science Direct website. Here’s the abstract:

Abstract

Trifluoroacetic acid (TFA) is a very persistent contaminant that has gained attention due to its multitude of anthropogenic sources, widespread occurrence in the environment, and expected accumulation in (semi-)closed drinking water cycles. Here, we summarize and assess the current knowledge on the anthropogenic sources of TFA to better understand the human-induced environmental TFA burden and highlight future research needs. Formation of TFA from the degradation of volatile precursors leads to diffuse and ubiquitous contamination of the environment. The analyses of ice core and archived leaf records have undoubtedly demonstrated that atmospheric depositions of TFA have increased considerably over the last decades in the Northern Hemisphere. Moreover, many point sources of TFA have been identified, which can lead to contamination hotspots posing a potential threat to human and environmental health. Also, unintentional formation of TFA during per- and polyfluoroalkyl substance (PFAS) remediation might become a major secondary source of TFA.