#wastewater — Public Fediverse posts
Live and recent posts from across the Fediverse tagged #wastewater, aggregated by home.social.
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#NYC #COVID #wastewater counts are still available on the New York State run portal, but not in the State open data repository.
In the State portal, #COVIDWastewater data is only available as one of two embedded Tableau charts - a graph or a map. The embed code is available, but it is a permalink to a snapshot of the data in time; it does not always show the most current data.
https://coronavirus.health.ny.gov/covid-19-wastewater-surveillance
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The #NYC Department of Health and Mental Hygiene released its July #COVIDWastewater data on August 3. It's now September 14, and there's no sign of the August data.
#Wastewater concentration is one of the most important indicators in the beginning of a #COVID wave.
The samples are tested within a few days of being collected. Something the Department of Environmental Protection or the DOHMH is doing between testing and the public repository is taking way too long.
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Innovative 'Four Ponds and Two Dams' #wetland system enhances #aquaculture #wastewater treatment.
#mightymicrobes #bacteria #biofilms #functional_genes #sulfur_metabolism #nitrogen_fixation #oxidative_phosphorylation
https://phys.org/news/2025-03-ponds-wetland-aquaculture-wastewater-treatment.html
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High tide for #Holtec
#Tritium dumped into #CapeCodBay will wash back onto community shores, says a new report
"The permanently closed Pilgrim nuclear power plant is now owned by Holtec, which wants to dump #RadioactiveWastewater into Cape Cod Bay. While waiting for a permit, so far denied, the company is quietly venting #tritium into the air."
by Linda Pentz Gunter, Posted on December 29, 2024
"Holtec, the company that has purchased a number of permanently closed #nuclear reactors in order to decommission them, has encountered yet another obstacle to its '#dilution is the solution to pollution' plans.
"One of the reactor sites Holtec has taken over is #PilgrimNuclearPlant in Plymouth, Massachusetts, on the Cape Cod Bay, which closed permanently in 2019. Holtec’s not-so-little problem there is what do with what started out as at least 1.1 million gallons of radioactively contaminated #wastewater stored at the site.
"The company first suggested it would simply release the wastewater into Cape Cod Bay, assuring residents and the immediately alarmed fishing community not to worry because (a) the wastewater isn’t dangerous anyway (b) everyone does this all the time at reactor sites and no one has gotten sick so far and (c) it would quickly disperse into the wider ocean. Holtec chose this disposal method for one reason alone: it is the cheapest.
"The proposal was vigorously fought by citizens, the state, and powerful Massachusetts Democrat, Senator Ed Markey. The state of Massachusetts effectively banned the discharge option, a decision Holtec is contesting.
"That Final Determination to Deny Application to Modify a Massachusetts Permit to Discharge Pollutants to Surface Waters was issued by the Massachusetts Department of Environmental Protection [#MassDEP] Division of Watershed Management on July 18, 2024. A month later, Holtec launched its appeal to reverse the decision, something that could take months or longer to find its way to court.
"In the meantime, help has come from a new quarter in the form of an in-depth study by the prestigious Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution [#WHOI], also, as it happens, based on the Massachusetts shoreline, near Falmouth.
"The study — Model-Based Study of Near-Surface Transport in and around Cape Cod Bay, Its Seasonal Variability, and Response to Wind — found that contrary to Holtec’s claims, the wastewater would not immediately disperse into the ocean, but would linger potentially for months, and wash up on the shores of area communities.
“'We found virtually no out-of-the-Bay transport in winter and fall and slightly larger, but still low, probability of some of the plume exiting the Bay in spring and summer,' said Woods Hole study leader and physical oceanographer, Irina Rypina.
"The radioactively contaminated wastewater stored at Pilgrim is contaminated with what Holtec and the Massachusetts Department of Public Health have described as 'four gamma emitters — #Manganese54, #Cobalt60, #Zinc65 and #Cesium137 along with #Tritium, a beta radiation emitter'.
"While the Woods Hole Study did not look at the health outcomes of releasing the radioactive water into Cape Cod Bay — only at the plume pathway — there are plenty of data that demonstrate the harmful effects of these #radioisotopes on human health, especially women and children.
"After acquiring the Pilgrim reactor, Holtec’s President and CEO, Kris Singh, assured surrounding communities that,
'the decommissioning of Pilgrim will replicate the superb record of public health and safety and environmental protection that typified the plant’s 47 years of operations.'But since that acquisition, Markey observed, 'Holtec has fallen woefully short on this commitment.' He noted of the Woods Hole report that 'In light of these recent findings, I urge Holtec to develop a wastewater discharge plan that is informed and guided by scientific fact and community input.'
"Long-time #PilgrimWatch activist, #MaryLampert, welcomed the report’s initial findings and said that 'Holtec dumping Pilgrim’s radiological and chemically #contaminated wastewater into semi-enclosed CapeCod Bay is harmful to human health, the environment, and our marine economy.'
"In a handbook explaining Pilgrim’s decommissioning process on the Pilgrim Watch website, the authors note that 'Cape Cod Bay, #PlymouthBay, #DuxburyBay, and #KingstonBay are all protected #OceanSanctuaries. Cape Cod Bay is a critical habitat for right whales and other endangered or special species. Dumping this #radioactive and chemically contaminated wastewater into them would cause incalculable economic damage and would harm both the environment and public health.'
"Absent a liquid discharge permit, Holtec’s preferred solution since has been to quietly evaporate the wastewater into the air. It has done this, as revealed during a Pilgrim Nuclear Decommissioning Citizen Advisory Panel meeting, by installing submerged electric heaters to increase the plant’s ambient temperature, ostensibly in order to improve worker comfort and expedite the drying of plant components.
"But, as Markey noted in an April 30, 2024 letter to Singh, the consequence of installing the heaters in that location 'is an increased rate of wastewater evaporation above the pace at which it occurs naturally.' That 1.1 million gallons is now down to 880,000 gallons remain, according to Holtec’s own reports.
"As Lampert points out, 'Meteorology studies show 60% of winds blow offshore,' which means at least some of that evaporated wastewater is going to fall into the bay anyway.
"Under Nuclear Regulatory Commission rules, Holtec has four disposal options: liquid discharge, evaporation, storage onsite, and shipping to a licensed facility. None of them are good solutions.
"In August, Holtec filed an appeal against the state’s ban on liquid radioactive discharges, in part claiming that the decision on whether or not to allow the discharge falls under federal not state jurisdiction.
"This, argue some opponents of Holtec’s discharge plans, is a stall and a distraction while it quietly gets on with the gradual evaporation of all the wastewater.
"'They’re using the appeal to buy themselves time,' Andrew Gottlieb, executive director of the Association to Preserve Cape Cod, told radio station WBUR. 'And what they buy themselves, with time, is the ability to continue to induce evaporation of the wastewater, so that ultimately it’s gone, at minimal cost to them.'
"Lampert agrees. 'Holtec can evaporate all the water to meet its schedule to dismantle the reactor building,' she said.
"In October, Lampert, along with other citizens representing the fishing, environmental, real estate and medical communities traveled to Boston to meet with staff in Massachusetts Governor Mary Healy’s office to demand that Healy’s administration call a halt to the evaporation.
"'There are laws on the books already that prohibit #AirbornePollution,' Diane Turco of #CapeDownwinders told the local NPR station after the Boston meeting. “And we’re asking our governor to immediately enforce those laws… She’s been very strong about no dumping in the bay. And we see this as a parallel assault on our communities,' Turco said.
"So far the governor has not taken action."
https://beyondnuclearinternational.org/2024/12/29/high-tide-for-holtec/
#HoltecLies #PilgrimNuclear #NuclearPowerCorruptionAndLies #NoNukes #RethinkNotRestart #NoRadioactiveDumping #WaterIsLife #AirIsLife #RadioactiveWaterDumping #NewEngland #BeyondNuclearInternational -
NASA Spots Details Of [Abandoned] US Army Base [Camp Century] Lost Under Greenland Ice [remote sensing]
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https://www.theregister.com/2024/11/25/camp_century_nasa_images/ <-- shared article
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https://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/images/153616/new-view-of-the-city-under-the-ice <--shared NASA post
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https://ahf.nuclearmuseum.org/ahf/history/camp-century/ <-- shared details of Camp Century and Operation Iceworm
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https://youtu.be/1Ujx_pND9wg?si=lUKSafROLBaD6TMf <-- shared U.S. Army 1950s video on Camp Century
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https://doi.org/10.1017/jog.2022.112 <-- shared paper
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https://cires.colorado.edu/news/greenland-and-legacy-camp-century <-- shared technical article
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#GIS #spatial #mapping #remotesensing #USArmy #CampCentury #OperationIceworm #Greenland #climatechange #contamination #risk #hazard #ColdWar #nuclearreactor #dieselfuel #risk #hazard #waste #PCBs #radioactive #wastewater #ICBM #radar #UAVSAR #NASA -
From #NEI, the PRO #Nuclear lobby! TEPCO has a long history of "Dishonest Acts"?!! And why are we trusting them to test #FukushimaDaiichi #wastewater?!!
Tepco admits leaktightness test falsification
Staff Writer November 3, 2002
"Tokyo Electric Power (#Tepco) staff manipulated main steam valves to reduce leak rates during containment testing in 1991 and 1992, the company has admitted.
"Tepco admitted the '#DishonestActs' in a press release on 25 October. The company said that during the two annual inspections at #Fukushima Daiichi 1 (Fukushima I-1), plant staff knew that the containment leak rate was too high. When government inspectors carried out the leak tightness test the staff injected air via the main steam isolation valves to reduce the leak rate. It is reporteed elsewhere that the real rate was 2% per day compared to the allowed maximum of 0.45% per day. By manipulating the valve, the rate was reduced to 0.12% per day.
"Tepco said the plant had been shut down for additional leak rate inspections, and an external commission comprising five specialist lawyers had been assigned to oversee the investigation. The company could not say whether 'dishonest acts were conducted in the leakage inspections at all Tepco’s nuclear power stations other than the above-mentioned two inspections'; nor could it say whether other tests at that plant had been #falsified. All the company’s leak tests are now being examined.
"Once again, the power company found itself saying: 'Tepco sincerely regrets and apologises that such dishonest acts were conducted.' Tsunehisa Katsumata has taken over as head of Tepco following the resignation of Nobuya Minami. At a press conference Katsumata said the data falsification was 'the gravest crisis since the company was established', and that the company had lost so much 'it should start again from zero'. Shigemi Tamura is to be promoted to chairman, replacing Hiroshi Araki.
"Meanwhile, additional cases of covered up crack findings were also reported by Tepco. According to data Tepco provided to #METI, these cases involve flaws found in recirculation pumps and piping connecting the pumps to the primary circuit at Fukushima I-1 to I-5, at Fukushima II-3, and at #KashiwazakiKariwa 1 and 2. Unlike previously disclosed cases of concealed inspection results, the inspections at these reactors were carried out by Hitachi and Toshiba, rather than by GE.
"In one case, Hitachi has acknowledged that, while under contract for BWR inspection work for Tepco in 1992, it found cracks in neutron-measuring equipment at a BWR at Fukushima. Tepco officials then asked Hitachi personnel to delete the crack finds from reports that they wrote.
"According to a Hitachi spokesman, a senior official in Hitachi’s nuclear plant design division agreed to Tepco’s request because Tepco was a Hitachi client.
"As a consequence of these revelations, plans to build six new reactors totalling 9000MWe at three sites have been indefinitely frozen. This will halt over half the new nuclear capacity that Japan had intended to have in place soon after 2010, including Japan’s first two APWRs."
Read more:
https://www.neimagazine.com/news/tepco-admits-leaktightness-test-falsification/#WaterIsLife #OceansAreLife #IAEAHides #TEPCOLies
#FukushimaIsntOver #NoDumping
#NuclearPowerPlant
#RadioactiveWater
#RethinkNotRestart #PacificOcean -
ICYMI
#Fukushima power plant: as Japan discharges treated #WasteWater, nuclear #radiation readings don’t add up
Story by Victoria Bela
9/20/2023- Discharge data logs indicate a reoccurring difference in incoming seawater and outgoing diluted waste water
- An environmental science professor says they would be expected to be about the same
"[...]On a rainy September 4, live data from Tokyo Electric Power Company (Tepco) indicated that the seawater being pumped in had a reading of 11 counts per second (cps) - a measure of radioactive disintegration by a detector - while the treated water and the diluted mixture heading for discharge both had a radiation level of 5.3 cps.
"Jim Smith, a professor of environmental science at the University of Portsmouth, said the background gamma radiation level in natural seawater was expected to be at about 10 cps.
"For the seawater pumped in and diluted water discharged, 'you would expect the two readings to be about the same - the gamma radiation added from gamma emitting radionuclides discharged with the waste water is unlikely to change the seawater radiation levels', he said.
"This discrepancy persisted throughout the first round of release that ended last week. The radiation level of the diluted mixture was always lower than the radiation level of the seawater being pumped in, according to Tepco data logs and their tracker on the International Atomic Energy Agency's (IAEA) website.
"Tepco's radiation detectors monitor the seawater intake pump, the transfer line the treated water passes through, and a vertical shaft the diluted water passes through called point VI on the tracker.
"'Looks to me like the detector at point VI is reading a bit low,' Smith said.
[...]
"The Post asked more than a dozen professors and researchers, some of whom had publicly spoken both for and against the release, to comment on the readings. Of the three who responded, two said that a lack of data surrounding the radiation numbers meant they would not comment.
"The Post also called the IAEA regional office in Japan about the data, but were directed to the headquarters instead.
"The Post was not able to connect to any of the technical experts stationed in the office that IAEA director general Rafael Grossi said was set up in Japan to specifically monitor the Fukushima water release.
"Calls and emails to the IAEA headquarters and its media office went unanswered."
#IAEAHides #TEPCOLies
#WaterIsLife #FukushimaIsntOver
#FukushimaDaiichi
#NoDumping #NuclearPowerPlant
#RadioactiveWater -
https://dcist.com/story/23/11/29/dc-chesapeake-bay-dead-zone-report/ “Our progress to date is largely because of these wastewater treatment plant upgrades” #savethebay #deadzone #waterquality #wastewater #virginia #maryland #pennsylvania
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#Japan will soon release #Fukushima #radioactive water into the #ocean. How worried should we be?
Some have cast doubt on the #IAEA’s findings, with China recently arguing that the group’s assessment “is not proof of the legality and legitimacy” of Fukushima’s wastewater release.
By Jessie Yeung, Mayumi Maruyama and Emiko Jozuka, July 5, 2023
"Robert H. Richmond, director of the Kewalo Marine Laboratory at the University of #Hawaii at Manoa, is among a group of international scientists working with the #PacificIslandForum to assess the wastewater release plan – including visits to the Fukushima site, and meetings with TEPCO, Japanese authorities and the IAEA. After reviewing the details of the plan, Richmond called it 'ill-advised' and premature.
"One concern is that diluting the wastewater might not be enough to reduce its impact on marine life. #Pollutants like tritium can pass through various levels of the #FoodChain – including plants, animals, and bacteria – and be '#bioaccumulated,' meaning they will build up in the marine #ecosystem, he said.
"He added that the world’s oceans are already under stress from #ClimateChange, ocean #acidification, #overfishing and #pollution. The last thing it needs is to be treated like a 'dumping ground,' he said.
"And the potential risks won’t just affect the #AsiaPacific region. One 2012 study found evidence that bluefin #tuna had transported #radionuclides – radioactive isotopes like the ones in #nuclear #wastewater – from Fukushima across the Pacific to California."
https://amp.cnn.com/cnn/2023/07/04/asia/japan-fukushima-wastewater-explainer-intl-hnk/index.html
#NoDumping #FukushimaWater #TEPCOLies #PacificOcean #WaterIsLife #Corporatism #Corruption #JapanGovernment
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High levels of drugs found in sea off south #England coast
Study says #MarineLife being harmed by prescription and recreational drugs in #wastewater
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2023/jun/09/high-levels-drugs-water-pollution-study-england-south-coast
#ToryPoliciesInAction #ToryPollutionParty #Sewage #SewageScandal #Environment #Sustainability #Wildlife
