The Environment Minnesota Research & Policy Center and the Minnesota Public Interest Research Group worked together to present “Too Close to Home: Nuclear Power and the Threat to Drinking Water.”

According to the report, the drinking water for more than 935,000 people in Minnesota is within at 50 miles of an active nuclear power plant — the same distance the Nuclear Regulatory Commission uses to measure risk to food and water supplies.

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According to the new report, “Too Close to Home: Nuclear Power and the Threat to Drinking Water,” the drinking water intakes for 11.3 million people in New York, New Jersey, and Connecticut are within 50 miles of Indian Point – the distance the Nuclear Regulatory Commission uses to measure risk to food and water supplies. The report also shows that Indian Point threatens drinking water supplies for more than twice as many people compared to any other nuclear facility in the nation.

This report includes new information showing that Indian Point Nuclear Facility is among the most hazardous nuclear plants in the nation because of it’s threat to drinking water supplies. Similar to the disaster at Fukishima Daiichi, an accident at Indian Point could contaminate drinking water for millions of New Yorkers. The report will show the number of people whose drinking water could be contaminated if radiation escaped to various distances from Indian Point.

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Perhaps the most obvious indication that it is, said Michael Webber, a University of Texas professor who heads a research group focused on water and energy, is how freely we use it.

“A hundred years from now, your grandkids would ask you, `You sprayed what on your lawn? That’s crazy,’” Webber said.

Watering lawns will seem as crazy as throwing diamonds on our lawns; we’re throwing the world’s most important resource – clean drinking water – on the ground, Webber said.

The idea that water is too cheap is endorsed by several water planners and policymakers.

“Water right now is underpriced,” said Becky Motal, general manager of the Lower Colorado River Authority.

A growing population requires more water, which the state says can’t come from one source. Addressing the state’s water needs requires a range of solutions, most of which are expensive.

“For most of our recent history, we just treated (water) as if we had an unlimited supply of it. We’re finding to our dismay that that’s not true,” said Andrew Sansom, executive director of the River Systems Institute at Texas State University.

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As reported by Miller-McClune, botanist Paul Cox and biologist Sandra Banack have spearheaded a consortium of scientists in researching the effects of the toxic molecule beta-methylamino-L-alanine (BMAA) present in cyanobacteria, which blooms in water and is often referred to as blue-green algae (though, scientifically speaking, it bears no relation to algae). Their studies indicate that as the consumption of BMAA increases in humans, so does the incidence of ALS, also known as Lou Gehrig’s disease.

ALS has been the focus of the researchers because of its severe nature — victims are paralyzed and typically die within five years — and the ability to accurately diagnose the disease in living patients. However, the findings also link BMAA concentrations to increased incidence of Parkinson’s and Alzheimer’s. Like ALS, they have no known causes and no cure.

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The problems in the two drinking water wells appear linked to the nearby drilling of two natural gas wells in 2008, says the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry, part of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

That news contradicts repeated statements from the Ohio Department of Natural Resources on the connection between the drilling and problems at the two houses at State and Remsen roads.

“We are the victims of fracking… and natural gas drilling gone wrong,” said Mark Mangan, one of the affected homeowners.

On Sept. 29, 2008, Mangan and wife, Sandy, found that their drinking water well had gone dry at the same time that a company was drilling for natural gas at Allardale Park about a half mile away.

When the water returned to the Mangans’ well in five days, it had an unpleasant taste and a rotten-egg scent. It was salty. It bubbled. It contained methane gas and a gray slurry of cement.

The Mangans could ignite the gas bubbles in the water from their kitchen sink, similar to what happened in the anti-fracking documentary Gasland.

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The assessment is especially relevant to Southern California, which has been a pioneer in recharging local aquifers with treated wastewater but still sends most of its runoff and treated water to the Pacific Ocean. A decade ago, public outcry and electoral politics thwarted a Los Angeles plan to partially replenish San Fernando Valley groundwater with recycled supplies.

Not to worry, concluded the scientific panel that wrote the report: “We can really say that there is no difference from the risk standpoint,” said Jorg Drewes, a water reuse expert who was on the panel. “You can have a supply that is as safe as the current drinking water supplies.”

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“There’s talk of a January vote and I think that is way too fast,” Stephen Waguespack told The Advocate (http://bit.ly/tdz3vA ) last week. He is reviewing the deal for Republican Gov. Bobby Jindal. The contract will need Jindal’s signature.

The 13-member Sabine River Authority Board is expected to vote later this month on a contract of up to 99 years duration, which would sell to private investors up to 600,000 acre-feet of fresh water — about 195 billion gallons — from Toledo Bend for 28 cents per thousand gallons. The state is allowed to sell up to 1 million acre-feet of the 76-mile-long reservoir, which is capable of storing about 4.5 million acre-feet of water.

If the terms are met and agreed upon, the SRA could net about $54.7 million a year. The SRA reports that in good years, its annual budget is about $4.5 million.

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Sure, that wastewater may have passed through sand, cloth filters, chlorination and dechlorination before a trip down the Trinity River, and then more treatment outside of Houston and a pass through my Brita before reaching a 212-degree boil on the stovetop — but still, the thought of drinking it made my gag reflex kick in, really hard.

In a normal year, about one-eighth of the water in the Trinity comes from DFW toilets, but the lack of rain this summer has upped the percentage of their waste in our tap water. According to the Trinity River Authority, concentrated wastewater accounted for nearly one-half of the water flow of the river at Lake Livingston.

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Officials rejected a call from environmental groups to order safety devices for all similar natural-gas wells, a requirement in neighboring Ohio.

A boom in gas production using hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, has led to a patchwork of local drilling standards. Now, several states are revising or formulating rules, and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is studying the effects of fracking on drinking water and weighing nationwide regulations.

“What you’re seeing now is the federal government trying to get into the game of regulating hydraulic fracturing for the very first time,” Ken von Schaumburg, a Washington-based attorney and former EPA deputy general counsel in George W. Bush’s administration, said in an interview.

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