CALIFORNIA FOCUS
FOR RELEASE: TUESDAY, OCTOBER 12, 2021, OR THEREAFTER
BY THOMAS D. ELIAS
“NEWLY NOTICED DAMAGE FROM FIRES,
DROUGHT”
It’s
always easy to see direct effects of both the unprecedented spate of wildfires
that has hit California over the last five years and the advent of this state’s
newest multi-year drought.
Those
include burned buildings, lung problems from direct smoke inhalation and
lingering smoke and ash in the air of distant locations. Plus, ground
subsidence, more expensive food as irrigation water becomes scarcer and more
expensive, and brown lawns in almost every city and town.
But
unseen, less obvious ill effects of both drought and the wildfires intensified
by dry conditions are now turning out to be about as pernicious as the more
visible direct effects seen on television news shows nightly.
Drought,
for one thing, always leads to more groundwater pumping in the Central Valley,
where farmers deprived of water supplies from both the state Water Project and
the federal Central Valley Project turn straightaway to tapping underground
aquifers.
Yes, in a way that’s an obvious
drought effect, as the spouts of irrigation pipes that once barely peeked out
from the earth’s surface now sit several feet over ground level, plain measures
of subsidence easily visible to drivers along major highways like U.S. 99 and
California 152.
But a new
study from the U.S. Geological Survey this fall shows that intensive
underground pumping has also sped deterioration of groundwater quality over
widespread areas. “This could lead to more public drinking water wells being
shut down if costly treatment or cleaner water sources to mix with ground water
are not available,” reported Zeno Levy, a USGS research geologist.
In short,
many Central Valley cities draw water from underground when they don’t get
surface supplies derived from snowfall runoff originating in the Sierra Nevada
Mountains. They get water from the same underground supplies farmers also use.
The
problem, as revealed by 30 years of studying nitrate concentrations in Central
Valley wells, is that those chemicals increase in drinking water when more
groundwater is drawn. A USGS chart shows how most public drinking water wells
start out taking water from levels far below where nitrates are most common.
But as neighboring farmers’ wells draw more from those deep levels, the depth
at which nitrates are thickest steadily drops and the unhealthy chemicals can
eventually make their way into drinking supplies.
This
turns out to be a regional problem, even with groundwater pumping more intense
in some locales than others. The USGS doesn’t say so, but it’s a problem that
could lead to some cities becoming ghost towns unless supplemental potable
water is trucked in, and in large quantities.
Then
there are the side effects of fires. A new Stanford University study, for one
example, finds that pregnant women exposed to smoke from wildfires have an
increased chance of giving birth prematurely. The study found that about 7,000
California preterm births between 2007 and 2012 were probably caused by such
exposure.
Premature
birth leads to incomplete development of babies, which heightens risk of a
variety of neurodevelopmental problems, stomach and lung complications and
sometimes even early death.
And a
reader in Magalia, near the ignition point of the 2018 Camp Fire that destroyed
most of the Butte County town of Paradise, reports that benzene has been found
in some local drinking water supplies.
Benzene
in drinking water has been linked to various cancers including non-Hodgkins
Lymphoma and acute myelogenous leukemia. Reported
the reader, “Months after the Camp Fire evacuation ended, the grandson of a
well-known and adored retail manager was born. Weeks later, he was diagnosed
with two forms of childhood leukemia.”
For
sure, tens of millions of dollars have already been paid to victims of benzene
exposure from motor fuels and other sources. If it now turns out that benzene
from burning natural substances has infested drinking water, an entire new
source of damage claims against fire-causing utility companies like Pacific Gas
& Electric will emerge, and it will be look out below for those firms.
What’s
clear is that the cataloging of side effects of both drought and wildfires has
barely begun. Which ought to add even more urgency to this state’s
often-incomplete and inadequate fire prevention efforts.
-30-
Email Thomas Elias at
tdelias@aol.com. His book, "The Burzynski Breakthrough, The Most Promising
Cancer Treatment and the Government’s Campaign to Squelch It" is now
available in a soft cover fourth edition. For more Elias columns, visit www.californiafocus.net
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