DYK ? : Nearly 3,000 places in U.S. have water worse than Flint,

Peachy, compliments on the filtration system you put in place.

Always good to buy water.

Did you discover from the state which carcinogens were discovered in the well 3 miles away?

While the earth's crust is highly imperfect ... it is also a very efficient filter.

Is your well lined? ... What kind of formation is the well producing water from? ...

@questionWeaver: Those are great questions. I have the name of the carcinogen at home. Unfortunately, I am not there now. Would my state, well company or town know what kind of formation my well is producing water from? I did not build the house or drill the well. I do know that it is a drilled well (very deep) as opposed to a dug well. Could this relate - in any way - to the specific formation? Are you an environmentalist? I would like the opportunity to discuss this further with you, if I could. I would also be happy to do any further inquiry if it would be helpful. Thank you.

@peachykeen: Peachy ... glad to chat about wells ... am oil&gas ... lol ... I drill good wells

Water drillers are not good at identifying producing formations ... only recently have states started requiring drillers to report.

A lot of deep wells produce from much higher formations. Drillers fool people into thinking the "good" water is located deeper ... the opposite is the case.

@questionWeaver: I am learning a lot from you. I really appreciate your time. Do you know if wells (generally speaking) always had a choice of having liners OR was this practice implemented later on? My house/well was built in '79.

Liners are used based on the driller, the formations you are going through ... and if there is a shallow reservoir that needs to be bridged.

Most all wells have surface casing, which is grouted in place (cemented) ... this is essential ... this is the source of many contaminents.

Do you know if your area is granite or sedimentary rock?

It is mathematically improbable that something in a well 3 miles away ... is getting to you .. but, there is a difference between fractured granite, quartz seam, sandstone or limestone.

What is your height above sea level?

One of the leading source of well carcinogens is weed killer / fertilizers ... if it is used near the well-bore ... it will simply flow along the surface casing, with the next rain ... find a vug in grouting and then drip into the well water.

Best to use weed killers that use salts, rather than compound organic molecules .... near the well.

@peachykeen: and @questionweaver ...... thanks to both of you for sharing that. I try to avoid hyperbole whenever possible , but this really is beyond shocking to me. Why aren't people up in arms about this ? It really is scandalous.

@pezzza: Hi Pezzza ... not sure about scandal ... there are far more people on wells than metro water delivery in the US.

There lacks general understanding of what is going on underground .. drillers exploit this by making up stuff, so they can earn money.

Common sense tells us, well contamination is local to the well bore in 99% of the discovered issues ... it is easier for rainwater to slide along 40 feet of pipe than permeanate through rock.

Most of the time people contaminate their own wells.

We can purchase better surface grouting ... but it is a lot smarter to stop using pesticides, herbicides and fertilizers within a 200 feet of a well.

A little more troublesome is people who use herbicides to control vegetation around ponds and lakes.

While it is almost impossible for those heavy molecules to travel through rock to a neighbors well ... those molecules don't decompose naturally.

It is not legal to do that.

It just makes more sense to use salts.

@questionWeaver: What is scandalous then is the lack of oversight and regulation , two things that are about to worsen even further once Trump is in office.

@pezzza: The problem for well water is not insufficient oversight or regulation. Well drilling and completion guidelines should be at the state/county level, since each state has unique geology, topography and hydrology.

The involvement of the EPA at this level induces inappropriate technical standards, which place people at harm.

My personal experience is the EPA consistently has promoted sub-standard, one size fits all solutions ... and has been successful at slowing the adoption of technical advances in water treatment and water purification.

The agency outran its mission 25 years ago.

They can provide guidance ... but should no longer be in the regulation business.

If Trump can break this organzation of its bad practices ... the more power to him.

And ... it is only the people in 4% of the country, the metro areas, that ask for more regulation. Cities have enough manpower to do their own environmental regulation ... without inhibiting the rest of us.

Remember, the EPA was to protect clean water and air ... currently, their regulations prohibit us from contributing to that mission ... quite an akward situation.

@questionWeaver: It is my understanding that the anonymous entity (that the law suit was implicating) is a scrap metal "junk yard" that is located approx. 1 mile from my house. This business has been in operation for more than twenty years. -- Their main source of metal is cars. They crush the cars, leaking oil and gas into the ground. You can clearly see a large oil "stain" on the ground surface from an aerial (googlemap) view. It is my understanding that there was limited regulation for this practice decades ago. Also, there is no system in place to monitor regulations now.

-- There is a river that runs along this business. Samples of water, from this water source, were also taken and tested.

correction to my previous post. The neighbor (who tested positive for carcinogens) was within [b]500 [/b]yards of my house. Not 5,000.

As you may know, speaking with "authorities" on the state and county level is sporadic at best. It is inconsistent and not enlightening.

Your insight has been more helpful.

@pezzza: It's not hyperbole if it is happening. Shining light on subject matters promotes conversation. Conversations are only perceived as threatening to people who are afraid of the truth.

Darkness/ignorance/blind faith should never win. Nor should companies bottom line supercede the health and well being of tax paying citizens.

I hope you never stop asking questions.

If you had not asked this question, I would not have learned from questionWeaver.

Thank you.

@questionWeaver: Based on your knowledge, I would be very interested to hear your honest views on fracking.

Hi Peachy .. solve one matter at a time

Topography and geologic conditions come into play with the situation you describe.

I have no doubt your neighbor's well has contanminents ... but without knowledge of the wellbore, depth, type of rock and elevation relative to the junk yard ... it would be dicey to confidently claim that was the source.

Sounds like the implication is that surface water run-off invaded your neighbor's well ... more likely near the surface ... well's are rarely grouted tight enough to prevent surface contanminents from entering.

A little simple geology, which you can do yourself is to determine if you are downhill of this source, the elevation of nearby lakes and how deep your surface casing is ... the health department keeps those records.

Water runs through permeable rock ... which generally filters everything out in 35 -60 feet

Pick up a solid rock ... the water goes THROUGH it.

Depending on your formations, water will also follow interconnecting vugs and fissures in the rock, to reach a wellbore.

My well bottomed in a 20 ft section of fractured quartz ... a super filter

Remember ... water does not go uphill ... it follows the path of least resistance (surface) ... it is everywhere under the ground ... only in calcium/limestone formations are there "pools" ... in 95% of the earth, it is in the microscopic pores within the rock itself.

The earth is an excellent filter of carcinogens ...

I ready doubt the junk yard is causing the problem ... it really really would take a lot of transmission fluid and antifreeze to cause problems ... just the math of it.

Ask the health department for your well info ... and do a little geology.

You might be able to get the EPA LUST fund to pay to plug your well and drill a better lined, better targeted well ... just a thought.

This is what happens when a recalcitrant Congress had for the last 7 YEARS refused to work with the Obama administration for FEAR he would get credit for good works done.

They deliberately worked to block as much as they could and NOTHING much got done.

In other words, the were not working for their constituents or for the American people. Now 7 years later, things are that much worse off.

They only care about taking care of the wealthy, the donors, the corporate interests, and damn the working people.

When you don't advance the EPA, or Obamacare, or hundreds other programs in order to screw the president, the mess is only greater.

This post speaks volumes to that.

Thank you for posting.

@CassandraFemale17: Thank you for reminding me of this post!
There is actually more to the story (that you may find interesting) Last month, I was speaking with my town's water commissioner. I asked him about the class action suit that was won and resulted in my neighborhood's water testing. I casually mentioned the metal/junk repurpose yard down the street from me. The water commissioner said that this [b]class action suit was not won in our state alone - it was a national class action suit against EXXON[/b]. They (Exxon) were supposed to remove an ingredient (carcinogen) in either gas or oil but failed to do so. I then asked him if our state got monies (retribution) and he said [b]NO, the EPA took the money and did not disperse it to the state level. [/b] He then went into a bit of detail, in hushed tones, but someone walked in and asked him a question. Bottom Line - Thanks to Exxon, I will be buying water until I move. Considering the housing market, that will not be in a hurry.

I think is is utterly disgusting that our government cares so little about the basic necessity of life.

@peachykeen: you will be happy to know that the EXXON CEO who led EXXON through that period is now Secreatry of State, and the Administration is busy trying to free such firms from any and all responsibility in compensation, and in lowering regulations and standards.

Those executives need more millions each per year.
Screw the people.
They can afford the charges at Trump hotels

And I'm willing to bet they are lining up to spend money there and curry favor.

@CassandraFemale17: I am [b]not[/b] happy about it. Not in the least. That is why I am blocked by half of this site - I simply cannot control my "enthusiasm" 😬 I don't care. People need to know the truth. I will not sit idly by and watch my country get taken over by a greedy corporate charlatan.

@peachykeen: you are 100% right. Don't let bimbos here silence you, and they block you because they aren't intelligent enough to counter you with a truth that makes sense. So, since they represent the nonsense, the only avenue left to them is to block you, and in doing so, they block information they don't wish to deal with or acknowledge