Writing in the August edition of Environmental Science and Technology Letters, Jason Nolan and Karrie A. Weber of the University of Nebraska report unsafe levels of uranium in groundwater from California's San Joaquin Valley and from the Ogallala Aquifer underlying Texas, New Mexico, Oklahoma, Colorado, Kansas, Wyoming and South Dakota.
In Natural Uranium Contamination in Major U.S. Aquifers Linked to Nitrate they note a correlation between concentrations of uranium and nitrate ions in the groundwater samples they tested. They theorize that the nitrate, a major component of fertilizer, can oxidize uranium from U(IV) to U(VI), making it water-soluble. They found that in the San Joaquin Valley, uranium reached as much as 180 times the maximum contaminant level (MCL) set by the Environmental Protection Agency, and nitrate was as much as 34 times the MCL. Samples from the Ogallala Aquifer had as much as 89 times the MCL of uranium and 189 times the MCL of nitrate.
Water from these aquifers is used for drinking and for irrigation. Soluble uranium is bioaccumulated by certain food crops; uranium in the human body can result in cancer and kidney damage.
The Associated Press also reported on the story.
(Score: 2) by GreatAuntAnesthesia on Wednesday December 09 2015, @11:12AM
Go look through your food cupboards. Wherever you are in Europe or the US, chances are good you have something in there from the San Joaquin Valley. Raisins? Nice bottle of Californian Merlot? Be sure to keep the receipts so that when you get cancer you can sue the state of California.
In other news, could this become a new way of harvesting uranium? Kind of like fracking: Pump nitrates into soil, dissolve the U into water, collect the water, extract Uranium?
(Score: 4, Funny) by c0lo on Wednesday December 09 2015, @11:30AM
Too expensive, lotsa water to evaporate.
Better process the ashes of the cremated deceased before releasing the ashes to the family - all the costs except the last step are supported by your... mmmm... raw material sources.
On a more serious note, using biological structures for leaching/concentrating minerals is not a new idea [wikipedia.org]
https://www.youtube.com/@ProfSteveKeen https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday December 09 2015, @12:32PM
Good example of using an oxymoron for humour/sarcastic effect.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday December 09 2015, @04:21PM
Maybe I'll start biasing towards Sonoma County wines, as far as the West Coast is concerned.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by frojack on Wednesday December 09 2015, @08:17PM
Who you gonna sue, God?
Quote TFA:
Uranium (U) contamination of groundwater has been primarily associated with anthropogenic activities such as mining, milling, nuclear testing, and disposal of spent nuclear fuel. However, groundwater U concentrations across the United States exceed the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) MCL of 30 μg/L in many regions, including those without anthropogenic U activity, indicating a source of natural U contamination.
The results revealed widespread U and nitrate co-contamination of groundwater and implicate alkalinity and calcium as geochemical parameters that co-control U contamination.
All indications are that it is totally natural and has been going on since the Pleistocene.
Do you really think those horizon to horizon buffalo herds didn't poop?
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Reziac on Thursday December 10 2015, @04:08AM
On that note:
1) Edwards AFB, primarily a research facility, was located in the Mojave Desert because even way back when, the ground there was considered too naturally-radioactive for long-term human occupancy. This factoid came up when some wit decided to sue 'em for contaminating the environment. No, God did it. Or the big bang did it, if you prefer. (Indeed, there are uranium mines in the area. There's also little to no groundwater, or it's very deep -- 250 to 1500 feet down, below several layers of solid rock.)
2) A while back I was researching bison vs cattle, and was surprised to learn that in the olden days, there were about 20 million more bison in North America than there are cattle today. Which given how much bigger bison are, equals 2-3 times the total biomass on the hoof, and therefore 2-3 times as much poop.
And there is no Alkibiades to come back and save us from ourselves.
(Score: 2) by gnuman on Thursday December 10 2015, @03:58AM
In other news, could this become a new way of harvesting uranium? Kind of like fracking: Pump nitrates into soil, dissolve the U into water, collect the water, extract Uranium?
Actually, an in-situ recovery for Uranium that is especially popular in Kazakhstan and starting to be popular in other places (including US) is,
1. drill a bunch of holes in the ground, call them wells
2. pump in battery acid into them
3. suck it out from adjacent holes
4. collect acid with dissolved uranium
5. extract uranium and acid (about 70% effective, 30% of acid is "missing")
6. eventually, neutralize remaining acid in the wells.
and proponents say this is better than normal mining because "soil is undisturbed".
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Wednesday December 09 2015, @11:15AM
Nice... DIY nuclear reactor grain storage using fertilizer in excess.
Would Monsanto be liable in case of a harvest meltdown caused by a bumper crop?
https://www.youtube.com/@ProfSteveKeen https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday December 09 2015, @11:16AM
This is horrible news! The Ogallala aquifer is very important. We might be looking at another dust bowl very soon.
To get some perspective Ogallala (according to Wikipedia)
* yields about 30% of the ground water used for irrigation in the United States
* supplies drinking water to 1.9 million people
(Score: 3, Informative) by fido_dogstoyevsky on Wednesday December 09 2015, @11:36AM
Not trying to spread alarm and despondency, but here's an interesting bit of reading [wikipedia.org]. Especially the section "Mechanism of the reactors" about halfway down the page which describes the importance of oxidising conditions.
It's NOT a conspiracy... it's a plot.
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Wednesday December 09 2015, @11:47AM
Bah, those afros. Look at US, they always go big scale*
--
*
https://www.youtube.com/@ProfSteveKeen https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday December 09 2015, @11:44AM
Radiation -> Mutation -> Evolution = Good
Evolution is Good, right, rabid science nerds?
(Score: 2) by GreatAuntAnesthesia on Wednesday December 09 2015, @11:53AM
Not sure if troll or just stupid.
Any "science nerd"[*], rabid or otherwise, will tell you that evolution is neither "good" nor "bad". It's just something that happens, like plate tectonics, or the Earth orbiting the Sun, whether we like it or not.
[*] what the hell are you doing on this site anyway, if that's your attitude towards science?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday December 09 2015, @12:20PM
will tell you that evolution is neither "good" nor "bad"
I don't know about that. There seems to be a perception with many people that evolution always results in 'better' organisms.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by deathlyslow on Wednesday December 09 2015, @12:36PM
And that perception would be incorrect. While it is apparent that what we have now "works" it's not necessarily "better" just more common. We don't "know" what precipitated most of the evolutionary changes. We have a good idea from the fossil and and other records, but we aren't sure, it's science ya know. That and we weren't around to observe it directly. I've also wondered when the disposition changes from mutation to evolution.
*I'm not a science major just an amateur thinker who trusts no one or no thing, very easily. I have to be shown evidence.
(Score: 2) by mcgrew on Wednesday December 09 2015, @10:15PM
Actually it would be correct if "better" was instead "a better fit for the environment", which is what "the fittest" means. "The fittest" means "the best fit for the environment".
Why do the mainstream media act as if Donald Trump isn't a pathological liar with dozens of felony fraud convictions?
(Score: 4, Insightful) by GreatAuntAnesthesia on Wednesday December 09 2015, @12:38PM
> There seems to be a perception with many people that evolution always results in 'better' organisms.
It all hangs on your definition of "better". Evolution can (over sufficient millions of years) turn fish into humans but it can also turn a T-Rex into a chicken. Would you say that a chicken is "better" than a T-Rex?
Evolution tends to (ie, not always) produces populations (not the same as individual organisms) that are, on average, more suited to the challenges of their environment and ecosystems than the generations that preceded them. If that's your definition of "better" then yes, evolution produces "better" populations of organisms.
However, most laypeople work with a definition of "better" that they got from watching X-Men movies. This leads to a false idea that evolution is some ever-escalating progression towards some kind of supreme superbeing, which in turn implies a grand cosmic plan to breed gods from plankton. There is no "progress" because there cannot be progress without a goal, and there cannot be a goal without a plan, and there is no plan. Evolution does not plan its actions any more than a river plans to carry water from the mountains to the sea. That's what the reference to the blind watchmaker is all about.
(Score: 2, Funny) by riT-k0MA on Wednesday December 09 2015, @12:45PM
Personally, I think a chicken would taste better than a T-Rex, and be easier to raise for meat.
Then again, I don't particularly enjoy the taste of reptile and/or carnivore.
(Score: 2) by arulatas on Wednesday December 09 2015, @03:25PM
How do you know that T-Rexes don't taste like chicken? Imagine the hot wings.
----- 10 turns around
(Score: 2) by Kromagv0 on Wednesday December 09 2015, @05:26PM
Imagine the hot wings.
I would imagine that they would be about the same size as the ones I can already get.
T-Shirts and bumper stickers [zazzle.com] to offend someone
(Score: 1) by riT-k0MA on Wednesday December 09 2015, @06:26PM
Have you ever tested reptile meat (Birds excluded)? Not my favourite.
(Score: 2) by mcgrew on Wednesday December 09 2015, @10:18PM
Dinosaurs weren't reptiles, as was previously thought. They were, unlike reptiles and like birds and mammals, warm blooded. Get a newer encyclopedia, that old 1964 Brittanica is a little out of date.
Why do the mainstream media act as if Donald Trump isn't a pathological liar with dozens of felony fraud convictions?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday December 10 2015, @02:47AM
First, T.Rex barely had arms--forget wings.
It appears that you are talking about a dragon (a mythical creature).
That said, if giant wings ever do appear on the menu, don't have the carhop hang your order of those on the side of your car.
That may cause your vehicle to tip over.
-- gewg_
(Score: 2) by Celestial on Wednesday December 09 2015, @05:26PM
Are you telling me that none of my descendants will recover near-miraculously from any wounds, live for centuries, develop claws, and call people "bub?" Then why is life worth living? :(
(Score: 2) by FatPhil on Wednesday December 09 2015, @12:34PM
I was tempted to take a peek at the AC's post so much that I actually did - oh, my, is that the thought-pattern of someone whose thoughts can barely be described as following any pattern. However, you can't let them beat you with incompetence.
Evaluating "evolution" as either good or bad is about as meaningless as evaluating "travelling" as good or bad. It all depends on what you're coming from, what you're going to, and why you're doing it. And even then, is doing something that's a necessity for continued survival actually "good", rather than just being "necessary"?
Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people; the smallest discuss themselves
(Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday December 09 2015, @12:42PM
I was tempted to take a peek at the AC's post so much that I actually did
I can only take this to mean that you browse Soylent at a threshold of 1 or higher. It's sad that, in 2015, Anonymous Cowards are still so discriminated against. You should check your registered user privilege, starting at +1 or even +2, while we Cowards are systematically oppressed with 0-scores. Stop being such an anonyphobe.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday December 09 2015, @07:56PM
Indeed.. I usually read set to zero.
Perhaps I should boost Anom to start at + 3 WISE.
(Score: 2) by mcgrew on Wednesday December 09 2015, @10:12PM
what the hell are you doing on this site anyway
He's obviously trolling, and you bit. Please stop!
Why do the mainstream media act as if Donald Trump isn't a pathological liar with dozens of felony fraud convictions?
(Score: 2) by Dunbal on Wednesday December 09 2015, @12:30PM
Is that uranium new or has it always been there? If it has always been there, what is the point of labeling it "unsafe"? Are they suggesting that millions of people must leave Nebraska and/or the farming industry should shut down? Life must be lived outside of laboratory parameters. Oxygen is "unsafe". It is highly toxic and can also enable fires. Water is unsafe. If I drop you alone in the middle of an ocean you will understand why. While it's interesting to use new tools to examine our environment, overthinking causality and trying to suggest the removal every single possible cause of pathology is ridiculous. Remember the Pareto principle. We only need to remove 80% of the danger to live about as long as we possibly can. Striving for that extra 20% will not get you better life, it will get you dystopia.
(Score: 4, Interesting) by c0lo on Wednesday December 09 2015, @12:49PM
The problem is that uranium always stayed there but recently it started to move into the population kidneys due to the excess use of nitrate fertilizer.
It doesn't even need to be radioactive, U238 is chemically toxic [wikipedia.org] enough.
Just from curiosity: in your mind, using less fertilizer falls into what category - the 80% or the 20% one?
https://www.youtube.com/@ProfSteveKeen https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 2) by jasassin on Wednesday December 09 2015, @01:48PM
Is there a consumer product that can filter the water or is it permafucked?
jasassin@gmail.com GPG Key ID: 0xE6462C68A9A3DB5A
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday December 09 2015, @01:58PM
> Is there a consumer product that can filter the water or is it permafucked?
Depends on your definition of "consumer."
From the AP article:
The school, which draws on its own wells for its drinking fountains, sinks and cafeteria, is one of about 10 water systems in the farm region that have installed uranium removal facilities in recent years. Prices range from $65,000 for the smallest system to the millions of dollars.
...
The uranium gleaned from the school's well water and other Central California water systems is handled like the nuclear material it is — taken away by workers in masks, gloves and other protective garments.
(Score: 2) by fliptop on Wednesday December 09 2015, @02:01PM
No. The weird thing about all this is the fertilizer manufacturing process itself causes accumulation of trace amounts of Uranium in the gypsum waste that's produced. It's why central Florida is dotted with gypsum stacks, instead of it being used to create something else, like sheet rock.
If there were an easy method to remove Uranium from water I'm sure the fertilizer industry would've figured out how to do it a long time ago.
Ever had a belch so satisfying you have to blow your nose afterward?
(Score: 3, Interesting) by frojack on Wednesday December 09 2015, @08:34PM
always stayed there but recently it started to move
No evidence of that was presented. Before there was farming, with the application of nitrate fertilizer, there were vast herds of buffalo over most of the study area. Buffalo poop. (Who knew?). Poop gets into ground water.
There is no historical data to suggest anything about "recent".
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 4, Interesting) by GreatAuntAnesthesia on Wednesday December 09 2015, @12:56PM
The Uranium wasn't causing any trouble at all when it was locked up in the soil and rock. It only became a problem when fertilisers seeping into the ground caused the Uranium to escape from the rocks and leach into the water table. Now you have water that with uranium content 180 times the legal definition of safe. Pareto principle or not, I'd be buying bottled water if my taps were fed from that aquifer.
(Score: 2) by Dunbal on Wednesday December 09 2015, @04:35PM
Everyone buys bottled water anyway. Do people even drink tapwater anymore?
(Score: 3, Touché) by GreatAuntAnesthesia on Wednesday December 09 2015, @04:37PM
I don't know anyone who habitually drinks bottled water.
Most bottled water is just tapwater anyway...
(Score: 2) by hemocyanin on Wednesday December 09 2015, @06:21PM
Tap water every day. But I have a well and the water tastes awesome. I've even had people bring jugs to fill. Fortunately, I don't draw from this aquifer, but I'm also now interested in how to test my water for this.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday December 09 2015, @08:18PM
Bottled water is tapwater. Why would anyone go to the extreme expense of filtering for uranium without reason? Bottled water would become as expensive as orange juice if this newly found problem spurs necessary action.
(Score: 4, Interesting) by mcgrew on Wednesday December 09 2015, @10:10PM
Bottled water? That shit's FILTHY. Not as bad as tap water (my tap water measures 136 ppm of contaminants), but at up to 60 ppm of contaminants it isn't clean. I have an expensive filter pitcher called zerowater that leaves less than one part per million contaminents, and came with a gizmo to test the water. If it reads over 6 ppm you're supposed to change the filter.
BUY bottled water?? I'm a nerd, I make my own and it's far better than I can buy.
Why do the mainstream media act as if Donald Trump isn't a pathological liar with dozens of felony fraud convictions?
(Score: 3, Funny) by GreatAuntAnesthesia on Thursday December 10 2015, @12:00PM
I make my own water too. I don't drink it, but you're welcome to try some if you want to.
(Score: 1) by BrockDockdale on Thursday December 10 2015, @08:30PM
Yes it was nice of God to create bottled water, a new totally separate type of water that doesn't come from the same place all the other water comes from.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday December 09 2015, @02:06PM
Like that city in Iran that has a really elevated background radiation level yet the residents cancer rate is no higher than anywhere else?
(Score: 3, Interesting) by MikeRo on Wednesday December 09 2015, @04:36PM
Different animal. I don't think you can compare exposure to elevated background radiation to ingesting food with elevated levels of radiation. Plus part of the problem is this isotope of U is toxic all by itself without counting radiation.
(Score: 2) by gnuman on Thursday December 10 2015, @04:02AM
this isotope of U is toxic all by itself without counting radiation.
Why are you even mentioning isotopes? All isotopes have basically the same chemical properties, they only differ in atomic mass.
From Oxford dictionary,
each of two or more forms of the same element that contain equal numbers of protons but different numbers of neutrons in their nuclei, and hence differ in relative atomic mass but not in chemical properties; in particular, a radioactive form of an element.
(Score: 2, Troll) by mcgrew on Wednesday December 09 2015, @10:04PM
Why is it that nobody brings up the fact that before WWII there was very little written about cancers, despite the fact that almost everyone smoked and burned coal to heat their houses?
Tons of radioactivity were released into the atmosphere from the 1940s to the 1960s. I remember once when I was a kid we had a thunder snow storm that dropped two feet of snow, and parents were warned not to let their kids play in it because it was radioactive, the storm system having passed through Nevada right after an above ground nuclear bomb test. Later they asked for kids' baby teeth to test for strontium-90.
Radioactivity is all over the US thanks to nuclear testing.
Why do the mainstream media act as if Donald Trump isn't a pathological liar with dozens of felony fraud convictions?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday December 10 2015, @03:36AM
Before ~1920 or so they were not even sure what it was. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radiation#Discovery [wikipedia.org]
In fact people thought it was 'ok' and used it for everything from clocks to getting your shoe size correct.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shoe-fitting_fluoroscope [wikipedia.org]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radium_Girls [wikipedia.org]
Think about this for a bit. If it glowed from 1910 to about 1960. It was probably radioactive.
(Score: 2) by gnuman on Thursday December 10 2015, @03:52AM
Is that uranium new or has it always been there? If it has always been there, what is the point of labeling it "unsafe"?
I know that there is always a trend to either label something "OMG radiations!" or "Radiation is good for you!", but in this case it's not even about radiation. Uranium is a really cold radionuclide, meaning it doesn't produce much radiation because it has a very long half-life.
So what is the real problem?
The real problem here is that Uranium is like Lead, it's a heavy metal that will kill your kidneys and cause similar problems like lead.
Now, according to EPA (nepis.epa.gov), the MCL is 30 micrograms per liter for Uranium in drinking water with target of 0. For Lead, their "action level" is 15 micrograms per liter for Lead with target of 0. So the levels are comparable on the regulation side. EPA didn't invent these levels out of thin air. So contamination of 180x that is actually very concerning. It means 2.7 mg/liter or 2.7 parts per million. If you drink 4 liters a day (a gallon for metric deficient), you are drinking about 4 grams of pure uranium in a year. If this was lead, you'd be exposed to serious contamination.
High nitrate levels are just as concerning. These can result in birth defects, anemia and other problems.
So both, nitrate and uranium are bad bad bad at these levels. While using that water to feed your plants, nitrates don't matter, but uranium can contaminate and get concentrated in the produce, which is bad for people eating it (think, lead exposure).
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday December 09 2015, @02:39PM
..if you are stilling drinking tap water after fracking, 50 years or air polution, and farming fertilizers, herbicides, DDT spraying, roundup, and everything else washing down into the water table....the uranium is not going to do much more damage.
(Score: 4, Informative) by urza9814 on Wednesday December 09 2015, @10:12PM
Where exactly do you think they get the water that they put into those bottles? Conjuration?
(Score: 1) by Frost on Thursday December 10 2015, @08:07AM
Filtration? Distillation? Recombination?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday December 09 2015, @03:01PM
hey guys, no idea, but if i move from this side of the auditorium to over there where it is labelled "paranoia wing"
could we spin this to mean, once again, "uranium to the rescue" because cali has a drought and this is a good
way to make people "fear" water and thus use less of it?
-
anyways, this uranium is a chemically bad heavy metal like lead, cadmium, mercury etc?
(Score: 4, Insightful) by dltaylor on Wednesday December 09 2015, @07:02PM
Once the Republicans have made it illegal to test for things like that, then it will no longer be an issue.
(Score: 0, Troll) by khallow on Wednesday December 09 2015, @08:33PM
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday December 10 2015, @12:57AM
Uranium is indeed regulated as a radionuclide [epa.gov]. The limit, however, was chosen because of its chemical properties:
—http://www.wupdhd.org/environmental-health/water-supply-protection-well-program/uranium-and-fluoride-advisory/what-you-need-to-know-about-uranium-in-private-well-water/
(Score: 2) by Username on Thursday December 10 2015, @12:58AM
I knew it would make a comeback some day!
Anyway, why can’t they just dump some binding agent like prussian blue in the wells?