Water & Oceans

On Washington's Olympic Peninsula, the nation's largest dam-removal project to day is poised to restore ancient salmon runs.

"South Florida’s lakes, marshes and rivers pump fresh, crystal clear water across the state like veins carry blood through the body. But cities along South Florida’s coast are running out of water as drinking wells are taken over by the sea."

Domestic drinking water wells in the region around Augusta, Maine, show levels of arsenic above EPA's new safety standards. Excess arsenic in drinking water can cause a range of serious health problems.

"As Miami prepares to dredge its port to accommodate supersize freighters, environmentalists are making a last-ditch effort to protect threatened coral reefs and acres of sea grass that they say would be destroyed by the expansion."

"Significant levels of the world's most-used herbicide have been detected in air and water samples from two U.S. farm states, government scientists said on Wednesday, in groundbreaking research on the active ingredient in Monsanto Co's Roundup."

"For centuries, water has been a potent weapon between warring states. When Pisa was at war with Florence, Leonardo da Vinci and Machiavelli planned to divert the Arno and leave Pisa dry."

"Pennsylvania is one of only four states with regulations in place requiring drillers to disclose on a well-by-well basis the additives and chemicals used in fracturing fluid injected deep underground into oil and natural gas wells. But the state is the only one not to post the data on the Internet."

"Beyond flooding and destruction, Hurricane Irene is likely to have caused less visible environmental damage by dumping sewage, pesticides and other contaminants into waterways along the East Coast, federal officials said.
High flows of water can also disturb sediment and make it settle out in new deposits that can clog oyster beds or require new dredging in shipping channels."