{"id":18906,"date":"2016-03-16T12:00:20","date_gmt":"2016-03-16T17:00:20","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/olduvai.ca\/?p=18906"},"modified":"2016-03-16T12:00:20","modified_gmt":"2016-03-16T17:00:20","slug":"confusion-and-fear-in-north-carolina-as-state-ends-drinking-water-safety-warning","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/?p=18906","title":{"rendered":"Confusion and Fear in North Carolina As State Ends Drinking Water Safety Warning"},"content":{"rendered":"<h3 id=\"page-title\" class=\"page__title title\"><a href=\"http:\/\/www.desmogblog.com\/2016\/03\/16\/confusion-and-fear-north-carolina-state-ends-drinking-water-safety-warning\" target=\"_blank\">Confusion and Fear in North Carolina As State Ends Drinking Water Safety Warning<\/a><\/h3>\n<article class=\"node-10414 node node-blog node-promoted view-mode-full clearfix\">\n<header>\n<p class=\"submitted desktop-only\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/www.desmogblog.com\/sites\/beta.desmogblog.com\/files\/styles\/full_width_blog_image\/public\/blogimages\/Down%20East%20Coal%20Ash%20Coalition%20Goldsboro%20NC%20March%2011%202016.jpg?itok=fTXelSlm\" alt=\"\" width=\"826\" height=\"391\" \/><\/p>\n<\/header>\n<div class=\"horizontal-social-bar horizontal-social-bar-top clearfix\">\u201cI\u2019m fighting for my kids and my neighbors,\u201d says a determined Amy Brown.<\/div>\n<div class=\"field field-name-body field-type-text-with-summary field-label-hidden\">\n<div class=\"field-items\">\n<div class=\"field-item even\">\n<p>Brown and hundreds of other North Carolina residents have been using only bottled water for the better part of a year now for cooking, drinking, hygiene and even for their pets. Like Brown, most of those residents live near impoundments of coal ash \u2014 the waste product created when coal is burned for electricity.<\/p>\n<p>Now residents are learning that the \u201cdo not drink\u201d orders placed on their well water supplies have been lifted by state officials. That decision has provoked fear and confusion among residents and some experts about the safety of their water supply.\u00a0\u201cThis news makes me feel like we\u2019re not getting anywhere,\u201d said Brown, before her voice wavered with emotion.<\/p>\n<p>In April 2015, the state began notifying residents their water wells were contaminated, many with the carcinogen\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/www.atsdr.cdc.gov\/toxprofiles\/tp7.pdf\" target=\"_blank\">hexavalent chromium<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/www.atsdr.cdc.gov\/ToxProfiles\/tp.asp?id=276&amp;tid=50\" target=\"_blank\">vanadium<\/a>, which is known to harm kidneys and affect blood pressure.<\/p>\n<p>Residents were issued the \u201cdo not drink\u201d notices by the North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality. Duke Energy\u2019s coal ash impoundments were suspected as the cause of the contamination and the company was compelled by the state legislature to provide bottled water.<\/p>\n<p>But last Monday, March 7, during a county commission meeting in rural Lee County, state officials announced most of the\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/editor.desmogblog.com:8000\/sites\/beta.desmogblog.com\/files\/Letter%20Mailed.pdf\" target=\"_blank\">\u201cdo not drink\u201d orders were being withdrawn<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p><span class=\"dquo\">\u201c<\/span>The first I heard of it was when the media contacted me,\u201d Brown said.<\/p>\n<p>Tom Reeder, the Assistant Secretary of the\u00a0<span class=\"caps\">N.C.<\/span>\u00a0Department of Environmental Quality, is one of two state officials who spoke to the Lee County Commission.<\/p>\n<p>&#8230;click on the above link to read the rest of the article&#8230;<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/article>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Confusion and Fear in North Carolina As State Ends Drinking Water Safety Warning \u201cI\u2019m fighting for my kids and my neighbors,\u201d says a determined Amy Brown. Brown and hundreds of other North Carolina residents have been using only bottled water for the better part of a year now for cooking, drinking, hygiene and even for [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[9400,5317,2749,9399,12973,11986],"class_list":["post-18906","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-environment","tag-coal-ash","tag-desmog-blog","tag-drinking-water","tag-north-carolina","tag-rhiannon-fionn","tag-water-safety"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18906","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=18906"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18906\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":18907,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18906\/revisions\/18907"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=18906"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=18906"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=18906"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}