Radon Continues to Plague Americans

  • David Aschenbrenner from Pro-Tech Environmental installs a radon mitigation system. (Photo by Mark Brush)

There’s an invisible, odorless gas that kills 21,000 Americans every year. We’ve known about radon gas for a long time. But as Mark Brush reports, experts say we’re still a long way from fixing the problem:

Transcript

There’s an invisible, odorless gas that kills 21,000 Americans every year. We’ve known about radon gas for a long time. But as Mark Brush reports, experts say we’re still a long way from fixing the problem:

Radon gas is found down here…

…in the basement.

Really, it’s all around us. The gas drifts out of the ground from bits of uranium ore. Normally, there’s not enough of it to cause a problem. But it can get trapped in our homes, schools, and offices. We breathe it in. And the gas can cause lung cancer. It’s the second leading cause of lung cancer next to smoking. And if you’re a smoker – you’re even more at risk.

The level of radon gas in this basement is unsafe. More than four times a safe standard set by the EPA:

So a crew of two guys is here to fix the problem.

David Aschenbrenner works for Pro-Tech Environmental in Ann Arbor, MI. He says radon gas seeps up from the ground and makes its way into the house through cracks and holes in the foundation:

“So as the air is rising through the house, the house acts as a chimney. It’s creating what we call the stack effect. And that’s what’s actually pulling the radon in.”

You can’t see it. You can’t smell it. But it’s often there.

“So with the radon piping, and the radon fan, it’s going to create a suction slightly stronger than the house breathing normally.”

They drill a hole in the basement floor – put a PVC pipe into the hole. And fan on the pipe will vent the radon gas outside.
Right now – a lot of people find out about radon when they buy or sell a house. The air is tested and if there’s a problem – it can be fixed.

Bill Field is an epidemiologist at the University of Iowa. He’s studied the health risks of exposure to radiation for decades. Field says these systems work. But even though more people know about the threat of radon gas – there are still more people exposed today than in the past:

“We’re further behind now, than we were 20 years ago with addressing the radon issue, because more homes are being built that aren’t radon resistant than are being mitigated. Each year there are tens of thousands of home that are coming on the market that will hopefully be fixed someday, but they could have been fixed when they were first built.”

Field says new homes should be built to keep radon out. He says simple changes in home construction – changes that would only add $500 in construction costs – would work. He says there should be a federal requirement to build homes this way, since radon can be a problem in every state.

There are some states, counties and cities that have radon resistant new construction written into their building codes – but more than half don’t – and even in the places that do have the code on the books – workers told us that it’s not always enforced – so it’s easy to just skip the requirement.

The National Association of Home Builders says it would oppose any federal requirements to build homes this way. They say radon should be dealt with where there are known hot spots.

There are parts of the country where radon can be bigger problem than in other areas. But it can be a problem no matter where you are. The EPA has a recommended standard for radon gas. It says that homes or offices or schools should be fixed if they have radon levels of 4 pico-curies per liter or more. But Bill Field says sixty percent of the cancers caused by radon were caused at levels below this EPA standard:

“Talk about a safe level of four pico-curies per liter is really a misnomer. It’s like saying it’s o.k. to cross the road blindfolded because there’s only one car coming instead of three. There really is no safe level of radon.”

A recent report by the President’s Cancer Panel evaluated the progress being made on cancer prevention. Exposure to radioactive radon gas is one of the areas where the experts said not enough is being done. And because the problem is getting worse – they’re recommending the government do more.

For The Environment Report, I’m Mark Brush.

“You can test your air for radon gas by buying a test kit at your local hardware store. They cost between ten and twenty dollars.”

Related Links

Shut Off That School Bus!

  • There are still a lot of states that don't have any restrictions on diesel idling. (Photo courtesy of the National Park Service)

Diesel exhaust has been linked
to a lot of health problems –
asthma, heart disease, and cancer.
That’s why so many states and cities
across the country have anti-idling
laws for diesels. Mark Brush reports
some bus companies are being caught
with their engines running:

Transcript

Diesel exhaust has been linked
to a lot of health problems –
asthma, heart disease, and cancer.
That’s why so many states and cities
across the country have anti-idling
laws for diesels. Mark Brush reports
some bus companies are being caught
with their engines running:

In Connecticut and Rhode Island , the Environmental Protection Agency caught a bus company called First Student breaking anti-idling laws. In some cases, they found bus drivers idling their engines for up to two and a half hours.

The government just reached a settlement with First Student. Tim Conway is an enforcement lawyer for the EPA.

“First Student really stepped up to the plate once we’d identified the violations. And they helped us look for solutions that would protect children’s health and protect the health of people around the diesel vehicle.”

First Student is now retraining their drivers and cleaning up their emissions. The company operates buses in 40 states.

There are still a lot of states that don’t have any restrictions on diesel idling. So, on any given school day, you can find long lines of buses polluting the air in front of schools, waiting for the kids to come out.

For The Environment Report, I’m Mark Brush.

Related Links

Getting Water to the Dry, Dry West

  • Colorado Springs pumps water through the Rocky Mountains into town (Photo courtesy of the Colorado Springs Convention and Visitors Bureau)

Out West, a lot of cities figure many more people will be moving in over the next few decades. Water engineers wish those people would bring along all the water they’ll need, but of course they won’t. Shawn Allee reports these cities want to pipe more water from far away, and some people think that’s a bad idea:

Transcript

Out West, a lot of cities figure many more people will be moving in over the next few
decades. Water engineers wish those people would bring along all the water they’ll
need, but of course they won’t. Shawn Allee reports these cities want to pipe more
water from far away, and some people think that’s a bad idea:

The air in Colorado Springs is usually so dry it quickly chaps your lips.

What gives? Colorado Springs sounds wet enough.

“There’re really no springs in Colorado Springs, so when you start talking
about water, it’s a divergence between our name and reality. Sounds like we
had a lot, and in reality we didn’t.”

This is Matt Mayberry, Colorado Spring’s historian.

I’ve heard about this massive water pipeline project the town’s cooking up, and I was
curious just how long the city’s worked to quench its thirst.

Mayberry’s got an exhaustive book on that with an exhaustive title.

“Blah, blah, blah … the emergence and appropriation of rights in Colorado
Springs.”

The crib notes version?

Early on, buffalo manure poisoned Colorado Spring’s creek, so people dug wells.

Then, the wells got infested with grasshoppers.

And the town grew, and grew, and grew again.

“Very soon you had to bring water from further away, and ultimately to the
Western Slope which is a couple hours drive of here.”

Today, Colorado Springs pipes water through the Rocky Mountain range.

Doing the extraordinary for water is kinda ordinary for Colorado Springs.

Its latest pipeline project is called the Southern Delivery System, and it’ll pump nearly
80 million gallons into town each year – and it’ll pump that water forty five miles –
completely uphill.

Impressive, but some people are asking tough questions about it.

“Our concern with this project is the greenhouse gas emissions that it would
contribute to.”

Stacy Tellinghuisen is with Western Resource Advocates, a Colorado environmental
group.

She says there’s a connection between pumping water uphill and a large carbon
footprint.

“Water is heavy. Pumping it over a great distance takes a lot of energy, and
in the process it would require something along the lines of 60 MW of power,
which is about a tenth of a power plant.”

And, for the most part, the utility burns natural gas and coal to generate power. Both
emit carbon dioxide, a greenhouse gas.

Tellinghuisen says Western cities are considering at least five other water pipeline
projects, some with even larger carbon footprints.

She wants Colorado Springs to set an example by using dedicated low-carbon sources
like wind power for its water pumps.

I ask the Colorado Springs Utilities about that.

Keith Riley helped plan the Southern Delivery System.

“We think there are some ways we can minimize the carbon footprint by
looking at some new technologies.”

Riley says there were lots of environmental regulations to wade through before the
Southern Delivery System got approved.

But a large carbon footprint doesn’t disqualify utility projects.

Riley says, even if carbon were considered, the project might have gone forward
anyway because the city’s expected to grow over the next few decades.

“Water is the essential element for all of us, so when it comes to that level of
sustaining our own lives, then you get to some trade-offs on what we’re
willing to do to keep ourselves alive where we we live, where our cities are.
No matter what happens, we’ve got to move water to Colorado Springs, and
we’re uphill from the river, so we’ve got to get the water uphill one way or
another.”

Riley says Colorado Springs Utilities is considering low-carbon renewable power for its
new pipeline.

But it’ll be expensive, and no one’s stepped forward with all the money.

Other Western cities are engineering clever ways of moving loads of water around,
too. And it’ll be a political and financial challenge for them to pay for the carbon
footprint.

For The Environment Report, I’m Shawn Allee.

Related Links

That Big Dripping Sound

  • According to the EPA, US homes waste 1 trillion gallons each year from leaks (Photo courtesy of the EPA)

Today begins “Fix a Leak Week.” It’s probably not in your calendar. It’s a new effort from the US EPA to encourage people to take a closer look at their plumbing. Tamara Keith reports:

Transcript

Today begins “Fix a Leak Week.” It’s probably not in your calendar. It’s a new effort from the US EPA to encourage people to take a closer look at their plumbing. Tamara Keith reports:

(sound of dripping)

It turns out that drip drip drip of a leaky faucet can really add up.

(sound of toilet running)

A running toilet can waste up to 200 gallons a day.

Michael Shapiro heads the water division at the EPA.

“A typical home will leak up to 11,000 gallons a year. About the amount of water that will fit into a home swimming pool, for example.”

Most people can handle doing the repairs themselves. Jim Loviss is the plumbing manager at Strosneiders Hardware in Bethesda, Maryland.

“Sometimes it’s a washer, sometimes it’s a hose or a supply tube. Most times it’s simple. It’s being able to shut the water off and find out where the problem is and solve it.”

But, he’s not expecting a rush on washers and toilet flappers just because the EPA has declared it “Fix A Leak Week.”

For The Environment Report, I’m Tamara Keith.

Related Links

Citizen Lawsuit Targets Foreign Ships

  • Ocean vessel loading grain at elevator in Superior, Wisconsin. Nine foreign ships have been identified in the lawsuit against international shipping companies. (Photo by Jerry Bielicki, USACOE)

For decades foreign ships have brought tiny stowaways – called invasive
species – into the United States. And once they get loose, they upend
ecosystems and cause billions of dollars in damage. The shipping
industry has yet to seriously address the problem, and now conservation
and environmental groups are suing the companies they say are most at
fault. Mark Brush has more:

Transcript

For decades foreign ships have brought tiny stowaways – called invasive
species – into the United States. And once they get loose, they upend
ecosystems and cause billions of dollars in damage. The shipping
industry has yet to seriously address the problem, and now conservation
and environmental groups are suing the companies they say are most at
fault. Mark Brush has more:


In 1988, the now infamous zebra mussel slipped out of a ship’s ballast
tank near Detroit. It didn’t take long for it to spread, first
throughout the Great Lakes, then through the Ohio and Mississpi rivers,
then on to Alabama and Oklahoma, and now it’s as far west as Nevada.


The mussels clog up intake pipes at water and power plants and mess up
the food chain. In some places in the Great Lakes, they’ve severely
damaged the sport fishing industry.


And that’s the damage just one foreign pest can do. More than a
hundred have gotten in and more are on the way. The government has
done little to stop the spread of these pests from foreign ships. In
2005, a federal court in California ordered the EPA to set up a system.
The EPA appealed that ruling.


Andy Buchsbaum is the Director of the National Wildlife Federation’s
Great Lakes office. He says ballast water from foreign ships should be
regulated:


“The law is very clear. The Clean Water Act says you cannot discharge
pollution into navigable waters, like the Great Lakes, without first
obtaining a permit. Period. Any discharge without a permit
is illegal.”


So, instead of waiting for the EPA to act, several environmental and
conservation groups, including Buchsbaum’s group, say they are planning
to sue several shipping companies that operate ocean-going boats on the
Great Lakes. They’re targeting nine boats they feel are the biggest
violators.


Industry representatives have said that ballast water regulations would
hurt international shipping, but in the Great Lakes, it’s estimated
that ocean-going ships make up only 6% of the overall tonnage.


Joel Brammeier is with the Alliance for the Great Lakes, one of the
groups that intends to sue the ship owners. He says a few ocean-going
boats have caused a lot of damage:


“The cost savings that we’re seeing from allowing unregulated ocean
shipping on the Lakes pales compared to the economic burden that
invasive species are placing on the Lakes. That’s stunning. The
ocean-going shipping industry is actually bringing in less than the
region is losing because of the things that ocean going ships
unintentionally bring in.”


The environmental and conservation groups who intend to sue say there
are ballast water cleaning technologies available now. The National
Wildlife Federation’s Andy Buchsbaum says they’re willing to back off
their lawsuit if the ship owners promise to clean up their ballast
water:


“This legal action is not designed to shut down the shipping industry
in the Great Lakes. That is not our intention. Our intention is to
get these guys to comply with the Clean Water Act. And that means
putting on treatment technology and getting permits.”


The shipping industry says it needs more time. Steve Fisher is with
the American Great Lakes Ports Association. He concedes there are some
technologies to clean up ballast water:


“I’ll be very frank with you. There’s technologies out there that will
do something.”


(Brush:) “So, why not use those?”


“Because a ship owner needs to know how high the bar is before he jumps
over it.”


In other words the ship owners won’t clean up their ballast water until
the federal government tells them how clean is clean, and so far, the
federal government hasn’t done that.


The EPA and the shipping industry say they’re working on the decades
old problem, but the groups that intend to sue say they’re not moving
fast enough. More invasive species are getting in. They’re hoping the threat of a
lawsuit will help force more action sooner.


For the Environment Report, I’m Mark Brush.

Related Links

States Pass Feds on Invasives Law

  • Federal restrictions have not stopped importation of invasive species. Now some states are passing laws that will stop some ocean-going ships from docking in their ports. (Photo by Lester Graham)

US ports receive more than imported cargo.
They often receive fish and other aquatic organisms
from foreign ports. They stow away in the ballast
water of cargo ships. Once in US waters, some of
the foreign species become invaders, damaging the
ecosystem. The federal government has done little
to stop these invasive species. Rick Pluta reports now some states have decided to take
things into their own hands:

Transcript

US ports receive more than imported cargo.
They often receive fish and other aquatic organisms
from foreign ports. They stow away in the ballast
water of cargo ships. Once in US waters, some of
the foreign species become invaders, damaging the
ecosystem. The federal government has done little
to stop these invasive species. Rick Pluta reports now some states have decided to take
things into their own hands:


The damage caused by invasive species carried to the US in
ballast water is not only harmful to the environment, but it
hurts the economy. The federal regulations have not stopped the
problem. So, states such as California and Michigan have passed
laws that require foreign ships to treat ballast water like
pollution. They have to clean it up before they can discharge it
into a port. The problem is, almost no ships have a way to treat
the ballast.


In Michigan, the Great Lakes shipping industry is trying to delay
the new Michigan rules. Shipping companies, port owners, and
dock workers say Michigan’s new rules are jeopardizing jobs
without actually stopping the introduction of new species into
the Great Lakes.


The damage caused by invasive species carried to the US in
ballast water is not only harmful to the environment, but it
hurts the economy. The federal regulations have not stopped the
problem. So, states such as California and Michigan have passed
laws that require foreign ships to treat ballast water like
pollution. They have to clean it up before they can discharge it
into a port. The problem is, almost no ships have a way to treat
the ballast.


In Michigan, the Great Lakes shipping industry is trying to delay
the new Michigan rules. Shipping companies, port owners, and
dock workers say Michigan’s new rules are jeopardizing jobs
without actually stopping the introduction of new species into
the Great Lakes.


People in the shipping business say the problem is Michigan is
the only state in the Great Lakes region that is requiring ocean-
going freighters to install expensive technology as a condition
of using one of its ports.


John Jamian is the president of the Seaway Great Lakes Trade
Association. He says requiring ocean-going freighters to install
expensive technology before they can dock in Michigan ports won’t
solve the problem. The ships will just go to other Great Lakes
ports.


If a ship goes to Windsor or Toledo that doesn’t have these rules
and regulations, they will discharge their cargo. If there were
any critters on those ships they could still swim or crawl into
Michigan waters, so you still haven’t solved anything.


Jamian represents the owners of ships that travel from the
Atlantic Ocean to the Great Lakes via the Saint Lawrence Seaway.
He says ship owners will very likely avoid Michigan ports, and
choose to unload at ports in other states and Canada:


“The fact of the matter is that they’re not going to put an
expensive piece of equipment just because Michigan calls for it
on their ship when in fact it may not be acceptable anywhere else
in the world and it might just be easier to take that cargo
across the river and unload it where they don’t have these
regulations.”


And for Michigan ports that are near other competing ports,
that’s a concern. Patrick Sutka is the treasurer for Nicholson
Terminal and Dock Company at the Port of Detroit:


“We fear these ships may be going to other ports, such as Windsor
right across the waterway, or other competitors of ours such as
Toledo or Cleveland.”


At the height of the shipping season, there might be three
freighters at a time moored to the docks, offloading steel and
other cargo. A hundred trucks a day will move in and out of the
docking area to get those commodities to factories.


On the dock right now are dozens of stacks of 20-ton slabs of
steel from France and Russia. That Russian steel was most likely
shipped from a port in the Caspian Sea or the Black Sea. The
freighters take on ballast water from those seas for the voyage
to the Great Lakes. That ballast water helps keep the ships low
and steady in the water.


The ships are required to exchange the water in deep ocean mid-
journey. The salt water is supposed to kill the fresh water
organisms. But, some organisms can survive the trip. That’s how
zebra mussels, quagga mussels and the round goby fish made their
way from the Balkans to the Great Lakes.


Those invasive species and others combine to cost the economy an
estimated 5 billion dollars a year. For example, zebra
mussels cost taxpayers and utility customers. It shows up in
your power bill because the utilities have to pay divers to
scrape the crustaceans off pipes carrying cooling water to power
plants.


Shipping companies, port owners, and dock workers’ unions are all
pressuring Michigan to hold off on enforcing its new law. What
they’d really like is for the federal government to step in,
negotiate with Canada, and create a regional set of rules for
combating aquatic invaders:


“…But the federal government has not had the guts or the
gumption to step up to the plate and get this done.”


Patti Birkholz chairs the Michigan Senate Environmental Affairs
Committee. She sponsored the law:


“So we’re going to do it on a state-by-state basis. Our eco-
system within the Great Lakes is what many scientists have termed
‘on the tipping point.’ We cannot deal with any more invasive
species in this system, and we know the majority of the invasive
species come through the ocean-going vessels. They know they’re
the cause. We know they’re the cause. We’ve got to deal with this
situation.”


Michigan’s new law is as much a political statement as anything
else and other states are starting to follow Michigan’s lead.
Birkholz says Wisconsin and New York could pass ballast standards
this year.


In the mean time, Michigan environmental officials say they
intend to enforce the state’s requirements when the Great Lakes
shipping season resumes in the spring. But, so far, no ocean
freighters have applied for a permit to dock at a Michigan Port.


For the Environment Report, this is Rick Pluta.

Related Links

States Silent on Great Lakes Withdrawal Regs

A year ago, governors of all eight Great Lakes states endorsed a
multi-state compact to protect the lakes against plans to pump water out of
the basin. Bill Cohen reports… a full year later, not one state legislature
has actually approved the compact:

Transcript

A year ago, governors of all eight Great Lakes states endorsed a multi-state compact
to protect the
lakes against plans to pump water out of the basin. Bill Cohen reports… a full year
later, not one
state legislature has actually approved the compact:


Most states haven’t even gotten one of their legislative chambers to okay the
compact. Most
people think the compact is to protect against shipping millions of gallons of water
to foreign
countries, but the biggest roadblock has been the fear that each state would be
giving up the right
to allow water diversions for its own cities and industries.


Molly Flannagan with the National Wildlife Federation says environmental activists
are not giving
up. She says 2006 has been a year to educate lawmakers:


“We had four states that had legislation introduced this year. We’re expecting to
have more states
introducing legislation next year. I think this is the year really of building
momentum towards
getting the compact done, hopefully in 2007 or 2008.”


Backers of the plan are also seeking approval from Quebec and Ontario.


For the Environment Report, I’m Bill Cohen.

Related Links

Seniors Find Niche in Environmental Work

  • In the forefront, Evelyn Kolojejchick, Ivan Pettit, and John Lundquist help to improve water quality as part of the Environmental Alliance for Senior Involvement. (Photo by John Kolojejchick)

Environmental work isn’t just for young professionals anymore. Retired engineers, former biology teachers, and others with time on their hands are working on environmental problems as volunteers. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Jennifer Szweda Jordan reports on how senior citizens are keeping environmentally active:

Transcript

Environmental work isn’t just for young professionals anymore.
Retired engineers, former biology teachers, and others with time on their hands are working on

environmental problems as volunteers. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Jennifer Szweda Jordan

reports on how senior citizens are keeping environmentally active:


(Sound of bird)


75-year-old Ivan Pettit is officially retired from his job as an environmental regulator, but he

hasn’t stopped monitoring streams, promoting recycling, and solving a nagging safety issue in his

state.


(Sound of walking)


On a sunny day in Oil Creek State Park in northeast Pennsylvania, he drops a stone down a corroded

pipe.


“Okay, go.”


(Sound of rattling, splash)


Pettit is estimating the depth of this remnant of an old oil well. It’s one of thousands of

abandoned oil wells in this region. The wells date as far back as 1859. Pettit and a team of senior

volunteers regularly hunt for old wells. The seniors’ work improves water quality and safety for

hikers and hunters, and Pettit says it helps keeps him fit.


“It is work that I have always enjoyed doing as well as getting you outdoors and being able to

observe the things that’s going on around you, that is not a sedentary task whatsoever.”


Pettit belongs to the national Environmental Alliance for Senior Involvement. The group claims

members as young as fifty-five. Pennsylvania has the third highest number of residents older than

sixty among U.S. states. Its active Senior Environmental Corps is touted as a national model, and

has been honored by the United Nations Environmental Program.


But senior groups across the nation are working on environmental problems. In Cape Cod, they

monitor West Nile virus. Seniors clean hazardous waste sites in Indiana. Michigan volunteers

install solar water heaters on poor peoples’ homes.


It’s a fast growing program. In 1993, 26 older adults made up the Senior Environment Corps. A

decade later, over 100 thousand were involved in work across the country.


Ivan Pettit’s work looking for old oil wells is the kind of effort that makes a real difference.

Besides being a hazard for hikers and hunters, some of the old wells seep oil into the ground and

it gets into streams.


In less than two years, the seniors have found almost two hundred wells. Environmental Alliance for

Senior Involvement president Tom Benjamin compares that to two college interns who worked full-time

one summer, and found fewer than fifty.


“Most of these individuals that were volunteers know that community and know the area. They grew up

there, they hunted those woods, they know what a oil well looks like, so they have some instant

recognition.”


(Sound of forest)


Every other week, from spring to fall, the well hunters line up horizontally, twenty feet apart,

and comb a section of forest. Some well holes are several feet across and twenty feet deep. Others

have narrow openings, but drop as deep as a thousand feet. Evelyn Kolojejchick and her husband John

lead Ivan Pettit and other volunteers in seeking out the wells and marking coordinates.


“Ok, longitude is?”


“Seventy-Nine.”


For both Evelyn and John Kolojejchick, well-hunting and other environmental projects are an

extension of teaching high school science for thirty years. Evelyn once aimed to spark interest in

many young minds. Now she feels she’s working on a smaller scale, but hopes to remain effective.


“I belong to Audubon, used to belong to a lot of other environmental organizations and it just

seemed like you needed… you needed to do something that was going to make a difference. I never

had any money to donate to all of these causes and you just you know, you want to do something that

an individual can do.”


Recently, the seniors saw results of well-hunting. They found sensitive species in a stream that

had once been polluted. Several oil wells nearby had been sealed with cement to keep acid mine

drainage out of the water.


“The first year we tested it for aquatic life, there was almost nothing there. And yesterday when

we were there, we had better diversity in that stream than we have in some of our streams that we

test all along that we know don’t have those kinds of problems. So they have made a significant

difference on that stream by plugging those wells. It’s remarkable.”


And it’s the kind of reward that these senior citizen volunteers had hoped for: making a difference

in their part of the world.


For the GLRC, I’m Jennifer Szweda Jordan.

Related Links

Billions Needed for Water Infrastructure

  • In order to provide safe drinking water for a community, water pipelines have to be properly maintained. (Photo by Keith Syvinski)

The Environmental Protection Agency says it will cost more than a quarter trillion dollars over the next 20 years to ensure safe drinking water in the U.S. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Steve Carmody reports:

Transcript

The EPA says it will cost more than a quarter trillion dollars over the next twenty years to ensure safe drinking water in the U.S. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Steve Carmody reports:


Benjamin Grumbles is the assistant EPA administrator for water. He says
the primary obstacle faced by most communities to providing safe drinking
water is the age of the pipes and other infrastructure through which the water
must pass.


Grumbles says replacing transmission lines and distribution pipes accounts
for two-thirds of the 277 billion dollars the EPA estimates will need to be
spent between now and 2025.


“Sometimes the materials will just break down due to age or other stresses.”


The biggest obstacle communities will face is paying for upgrades of their
existing infrastructure.


The federal government only provides a small amount of seed money for
upgrading local water utilities, amounting to only 850 million dollars this
year.


For the GLRC, I’m Steve Carmody.

Related Links

Living on Top of a Fuel Pipeline

  • Shelley Miller stands by one of the markers in her backyard that shows where a pipeline is located. Miller has two pipelines in her backyard and two others just beyond her property line in the neighbor's yard. (Photo by Tom Weber)

There are thousands of miles of pipelines in the U.S. constantly shuttling gas, oil, and other fuels from state to state. And although you might not realize the pipes might be under your property, the companies that own them have to keep the land above the pipes clear in case of an emergency. And over the past year, residents in some communities have been told they need to dig up trees and remove sheds to keep the path clear. In some cases, it’s more than just an inconvenience. It’s costly. But the homeowners aren’t all mad at the pipeline companies. They’re mad at the people who built their houses. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Tom Weber reports:

Transcript

There are thousands of miles of pipelines in the U.S., constantly shuttling gas, oil, and other fuels
from state to state. And although you might not realize the pipes might be under your property,
the companies that own them have to keep the land above the pipes clear in case of an
emergency. And over the past year, residents in some communities have been told they need to
dig up trees and remove sheds to keep the path clear. In some cases, it’s more than just an
inconvenience. It’s costly. But the homeowners aren’t all mad at the pipeline companies. They’re
mad at the people who built their houses. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Tom Weber
reports:


Pipelines are a crucial link in the trip gasoline makes from the refinery to your car. They
crisscross the country, but most people don’t notice them.


Shelley Miller didn’t notice for years, even though she sleeps less than 30 feet from four of them
under her and her neighbors’ yard.


They carry gasoline, natural gas, heating oil and jet fuel.


In fact, more than 20-thousand gallons of fuel will race under Miller’s yard in St. Louis suburb of
St. Peters, Missouri by the time this story is over. She and her husband knew the pipes were there
when they bought the house… but they thought they were used for water or sewage.


The Millers didn’t realize they were wrong until last year… when Explorer Pipeline Company
came to make sure the land above its pipe was easily accessible.


For Miller, that meant two trees had to be removed, along with a shed that had become her
backyard’s equivalent of a kitchen junk drawer.


“We had planned to re-side our home. So we have siding we purchased one bit at a time to get to
that point. We don’t know where we’re going to put that. The lawn tractors, where we going to
put that? Where you going to move all this stuff?”


But that’s a small price to pay to make sure pipeline crews can get in fast if there’s an emergency.


Fred Low is a lawyer for Explorer Pipeline. He says companies like his have made an extra effort
in recent years to clear more urban or developed areas that have pipelines…


“In our industry, there have been some accidents in the past. There’s been national attention and
we want to do a better job. And to do a better job of running our pipeline we have to do a better
job maintaining our pipeline.”


And Miller understands that. She’s not mad at the companies because the pipelines were there
first. What upsets her is that 35 years ago, the city allowed the homes to be built so close to the
pipes.


More than 160 homes in St. Peters, Missouri have at least one pipeline in their backyard. But
Alderman Jerry Hollingsworth says it’s hard to blame the city.


“There were no guidelines for a city on how close to build a home next to a pipeline 35 years
ago. So somebody came in and said, ‘I’m going to build some houses in here’ and the city said
‘okay!'”


And many towns across the country did the same thing. Todd Swanstrom teaches Public Policy
at Saint Louis University. He says more and more suburbs might have to deal with pipelines as
they keep growing. Adding a subdivision or even a strip mall sounds nice if it adds to tax
revenue. But there’s also safety to think about…


“If there were an explosion and people lost their lives from a pipeline, I think it would be a very
different situation. As it is, it seems to be one of those issues that has largely gone under the
radar.”


But even if every growing suburb in the U.S. had rules for building on pipelines, there could still
be accidents… or deaths.


Ivel, Kentucky, San Jose, California and Whitehall, Pennsylvania are among communities where
pipelines have exploded in the past few years.


But Explorer Pipelines’ Fred Low says overall, pipeline companies have had an impressive safety
record.


“Being next to a pipeline isn’t necessarily that bad. There are literally millions of people who live
by pipelines. And we will not let structures be built on our easements, so that’s why we want to
keep them visible so we can find out if we’re being encroached upon.”


Since the St. Peters pipelines were laid in 1971, the city’s population has exploded and expanded
along the pipelines.


For Shelley Miller… her efforts now focus on raising awareness for others. She and her neighbors
have organized a group that pushes cities and towns to enact better rules for how land around the
pipes is developed, and how people are told of the lines before they buy a house.


St. Peters now has a law restricting development around pipelines. But that only does so much
for Miller as she goes to bed every night just a few feet from all that gasoline.


“When we hear a loud boom, yeah, we sit up in bed. We think about it. There’s a risk with
everything you do in life, but when you have to live with it on a 24/7 basis and you don’t know
what the next minute’s gonna bring, it stays on your mind.”


For the GLRC, I’m Tom Weber.

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