Drinking Water (39 page)

p. 95

“animal food at their tables”: Blake,
Water for the Cities
, 9.

p. 95

fresh from designing the water system: This story is recounted in Morris,
The Blue Death
, 137–138.

p. 95

reversed the flow: Robert Glennon,
Unquenchable: America’s Water Crisis and What to Do About It
(Washington, DC: Island Press, 2009), 209.

p. 96

too many potential intervening factors: Missouri v. Illinois, 200 U.S. 496 (1906).

p. 96

jewels in England’s colonial crown: This story is recounted in Gleick,
The World’s Water
, 129.

p. 97

fever still claimed thousands: Chapelle,
Wellsprings
, 181.

p. 98

Sanskrit writings from approximately 2000 BC: Kathy Jes-person, “Search for Clean Water Continues,”
On Tap
, Summer 1996, 6,
http://www.nesc.wvu.edu/ndwc/pdf/OT/OTs96.pdf
.

p. 98

the range of treatment technologies: Ibid.

p. 98

the common practice was light boiling: Cast, “Women Drinking in Early Modern England,” 2.

p. 98

purifying water by passing it: “History of Drinking Water Systems,” Department of Engineering, Mercer University (2005),
http://egrweb.mercer.edu/eve406/eve406rom/documents/History-Water.pdf
; Baker,
The Quest for Pure Water
, 19, 118.

p. 98

first municipal plant was not built: “History of Drinking Water Systems,” 2.

p. 99

tombs of the Egyptian pharaohs: M. N. Baker,
The Quest for Pure Water
(Denver: American Waste Water Association, 1948), 2.

p. 100

“water did not cause typhoid”: Joel A. Tarr & T. F. Josie, “Critical Decisions in Pittsburgh Water and Wastewater Treatment,” in
A History of Water: The World of Water
, eds. Terje Tvedt and Terje Oestigaard (London: I. B. Tauris, 2006), 206.

p. 100

adoption of chlorinated water: Patrick Gurian and Joel A. Tarr, “The First Federal Drinking Water Quality Standards and Their Evolution: A History from 1914 to 1974,” in
Improving Regulation: Cases in Environment, Health, and Safety
, eds. Paul S. Fischbeck and R. Scott Farrow (Washington, DC: Resources for the Future, 2001), 43, 53.

p. 100

more than five thousand water treatment systems: Chapelle,
Wellsprings
, 15.

p. 100

the bottled water sector collapsed: Ibid.

p. 101

any other technological advance: Ibid.

p. 101

“horses and other animals refuse”: Joseph Race,
Chlorination of Water
(1918), 63.

p. 101

“delivered to Jersey City pure”: The Mayor and Aldermen of Jersey City v. Jersey City Water Supply Company 79 N.J. Ct of Chancery Reports 212, 214 (July 11, 1911). See also Race,
Chlorination of Water
, 12.

p. 101

“as pure as mountain spring water” Morris,
The Blue Death
, 161.

p. 102

fortified cities fell: Raymond P. Dougherty, “Sennacherib and the Walled Cities of Judah,”
Journal of Biblical Literature
49, no. 2 (1930), 160, 162-63.

p. 102

“Millo in the city of David”: 2 Chronicles 32:5.

p. 103

the dark, winding 533-meter path: Amos Frumkin and Aryeh Shimron, “Tunnel Engineering in the Iron Age: Geoarchaeology of the Siloam Tunnel, Jerusalem,”
Journal of Archaeological Science
33 (2006), 227–28.

p. 103

“I imposed my yoke”: Dougherty, “Sennacherib and the Walled Cities of Judah,” 162.

p. 104

leasing official mugs:
London: The Greatest City
; “The Great Conduit,” Florilegium Urbanum,
http://www.trytel.com/~tristan/towns/florilegium/community/cmfabr24.html
; Roger D. Hansen, “Water-Related Infrastructure in Medieval London,”
WaterHistory.org
,
http://www.waterhistory.org/histories/london/london.pdf
.

p. 104

contracted with their local monasteries: “The Great Conduit.”

p. 104

“a glass of water fit to drink”: As quoted in Peter Gleick,
Bottled and Sold
(Washington, DC: Island Press, 2010), 4.

p. 104

a philanthropic society: Howard Malchow, “Free Water: The Public Drinking Fountain Movement and Victorian London,”
London Journal
4 (1978), 181, 184–188.

p. 105

a venture dedicated to the common good: “The Metropolitan Drinking Fountain and Cattle Trough Association,”
DrinkingFountains.org
,
http://www.drinkingfountains.org/Attachments%28PDF%29/DFA%20HIstory.pdf
.

p. 106

commemoration of the drinking fountain: Lithograph from
Illustrated London News
, Apr. 30, 1859.

p. 107

the grandeur of the civic edifice: The photograph can be found at Wikimedia,
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Worcester_Cross_drinking_fountain,_Kidderminster_-_DSCF0918.jpg
.

p. 108

about one pipe break a day: Charles Duhigg, “Saving U.S. Water and Sewer Systems Would Be Costly,”
New York Times
, Mar. 14, 2010.

p. 109

thirty-six million gallons per day: Ken Belson, “Plumber’s Job on a Giant’s Scale: Fixing New York’s Drinking Straw,”
New York Times
, Nov. 22, 2008,
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/23/nyregion/23tunnel.html
.

p. 109

the lead soldering used to join: “What’s on Tap,” National Resources Defense Council, June 2003,
http://www.nrdc.org//water/drinking/uscities/contents.asp
.

p. 109

breaks in water and sewer lines: Glennon,
Unquenchable
, 211.

p. 109

we need $335 billion: Duhigg, “Saving U.S. Water and Sewer Systems,”
New York Times
, Mar. 14, 2010.

p. 110

waterborne parasites, viruses: Ibid.

p. 110

about nine hundred deaths: Glennon,
Unquenchable
, 66.

p. 110

This history is based on the research of the architectural historian, Giorgio Gionighian. Giorgio Gionighian,
Building a Renaissance Double House in Venice
, 8 ARQ 299 (nos. 3/4, 2004). See also Giorigio Gianighian,
L’Acqua di Venezia: Dal medioevo all’acquedotto e oltre
, Ananke 134 (2010).

p. 112

Illustrazioni di G. Del Pedros © tratte da
Venezia come
di G. Gianighian e P. Pavanini, Ambier & Keller editors, Venezia 2010. Reproduced with publisher’s permission.

p. 113

analysis of his hair suggests arsenic: “Napoleon poison theory revived,”
CNN World
, June 1, 2001,
http://articles.cnn.com/2001-06-01/world/napoleon.poisoning_1_pascal-kintz-ben-weider-hair-samples?_s=PM:WORLD
.

p. 114

to remedy this public health problem: Allan H. Smith et al., “Contamination of Drinking-Water by Arsenic in Bangladesh: a Public Health Emergency,”
Bulletin of the World Health Organization
78 (2000), 1093; A. Mushtaque and R. Chowdhury, “Arsenic Crisis in Bangladesh,”
Scientific American
(Aug. 2004), 86, 90.

p. 114

“more than 10 million tubewells”: Ibid.

p. 115

concentrations below 50 parts: This history is recounted in Cass R. Sunstein, “The Arithmetic of Arsenic,”
Georgetown Law Journal
90 (2002), 2255.

p. 115

one drop of arsenic in fifty drums: Charles Duhigg, “That Tap Water is Legal but may be Unhealthy,”
New York Times
, Dec. 17, 2009.

p. 115

“but you didn’t vote for this”: As quoted in Sunstein, “The Arithmetic of Arsenic,” 2255.

p. 117

“the groundwater can kill you”: Email from Alex Pfaff, Professor, Sanford Institute for Public Policy, Duke University, to author (Sept. 26, 2007).

p. 117

the harm from microbial diseases: Ibid. Moreover, many of the traditional ponds used as water sources have since been polluted or converted into aquaculture.

p. 117

“arsenic-contaminated tube-well water”: Ben Crow and Farhana Sultana, “Gender, Class, and Access to Water: Three Cases in a Poor and Crowded Delta,”
Society and Natural Resources
15 (2002), 709, 718.

p. 117

“Tubewells had fitted nicely”: Mushtaque and Chowdhury, “Arsenic Crisis in Bangladesh,” 90.

p. 118

ten versus fifty seconds: Zane Satterfield, “What Does Ppm or Ppb Mean?,” National Environmental Services Center at West Virginia University,
http://www.nesc.wvu.edu/ndwc/articles/ot/fa04/q&a.pdf
.

p. 118

additional capacity in the water treatment plant: Jason K. Burnett and Robert W. Hahn, “A Costly Benefit,”
Regulation
(Fall 2001), 44.

p. 118

estimates ranging from six lives saved: Sunstein, “The Arithmetic of Arsenic,” 2258. “Today, the maximum contaminant level for arsenic is ten parts per billion, and more than fifty-six million Americans drink water that exceeds this level.” Royte,
Bottlemania
, 121.

p. 119

“range below 50 parts per billion”: Sunstein, “The Arithmetic of Arsenic,” 2258.

p. 119

bladder, colon, and rectal cancer: John D. Graham and Jonathan Baert Wiener, “Confronting Risk Tradeoffs,” in
Risk Versus Risk: Tradeoffs in Protecting Health and the Environment
, eds. John D. Graham and Jonathan Baert Wiener (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1995), 15; Morris,
The Blue Death
, 168–177.

p. 119

younger versus older victims: Susan W. Putnam and Jonathan Baert Wiener, “Seeking Safe Drinking Water,” in
Ibid
. 124–125.

p. 119

Interfere with the endocrine system: “Endocrine Disruptors/PPCPs,” American Water Works Association,
http://www.awwa.org//Resources/topicspecific.cfm?ItemNumber=3647&navItemNumber=1580
; “New Findings on the Timing of Sexual Maturity,” Our Stolen Future,
http://www.ourstolenfuture.org//NewScience/reproduction/Puberty/puberty.htm
.

p. 120

behavior of certain wildlife: “IPCS Global Assessment of EDCs,” World Health Organization,
http://www.who.int/ipcs/publications/en/ch1.pdf
.

p. 120

impact on human populations: J. H. Kim, “Removal of Endocrine Disruptors Using Homogeneous Metal Catalyst Combined with Nanofiltration Membrane,”
Water Science and Technology
51 (2005), 381.

p. 120

other persistent organic pollutants: Jerome Nriagu, “Pollutants and Health of Communities in the Great Lakes Basin,”
http://www.miseagrant.umich.edu/downloads/research/papers/GLCOMM.pdf
.

p. 120

ten times higher than the level: “Endocrine Disruptors,” Birth Defect Research for Children,
http://www.birthdefects.org//research/factsheets/fact%20EDCs.pdf
.

p. 121

widely used for controlling mosquitoes: Heidi J. Auman et al, “PCBS, DDE, DDT, and TCDD-EQ in Two Species of Island, Midway Atoll, North Pacific Ocean,”
Environmental Toxicology and Chemistry
16 (1997), 498.

p. 121

so-called intersex fish: “Intersex Fish Found in Susquehanna River, Delmarva Lakes,” Chesapeake Bay Program, Nov. 17, 2010,
http://www.chesapeakebay.net/news_intersexfish10.aspx?menuitem=54704
.

p. 121

Florida’s Lake Apopka: “Endocrine Disruptors on the Gulf Coast,” Regional Perspectives in Environmental Science,
http://www.mhhe.com/biosci/pae/environmentalscience/ca sestudies/case7.mhtml
.

p. 121

pharmaceuticals and personal care products: See, e.g., Julie Gerberding, “Pharmaceuticals and Personal Care Products (PPCPs) in Drinking Water,”
DrinkTap.org
,
http://www.drinktap.org//consumerdnn/Home/WaterInformation/WaterQuality/PharmaceuticalsPPCPs/tabid/73/Default.aspx
; Abby C. Collier, “Pharmaceutical Contaminants in Pota Water: Potential Concerns for Pregnant Women and Children,”
EcoHealth
4 (2007), 164, 170.

p. 121

80 percent of the streams: Jennifer Waters, “Water shortages,”
CQ Researcher
20 (June 18, 2010), 529.

p. 121

study of private wells: Glennon,
Unquenchable
, 71.

p. 121

fifty-six pharmaceuticals or their by-products: Jeff Donn, Martha Mendoza, and Justin Pritchard, “Pharmaceuticals lurking in U.S. drinking water,” MSNBC.com., Mar. 10, 2008.

p. 122

steroids and antibiotics near cattle feedlots: “Antibiotics Used for Growth in Food Animals Making their Way into Waterways,”
Science Daily
, Oct. 25, 2004.

p. 122

New York, Houston, Chicago: Donn, Mendoza, and Pritchard, “Pharmaceuticals lurking in U.S. drinking water.”

p. 122

“exposed to other people’s drugs”: Ibid.

p. 122

“might pose a risk to water safety”: “Meeting report: pharmaceuticals in water,”
Environmental Health Perspectives
, July 2010, 1016.

p. 122

pharmaceutical traces in drinking water: Jennifer Waters, “Water Shortages,” 529.

p. 122

“emergent contaminants”: Glennon,
Unquenchable
, 168.

p. 123

“the doses are so small”: Ibid.

p. 123

twenty Olympic-size swimming pools: “Priest Point Park Sediment Study Shows Very Low Dioxin Levels,” Washington Department of Ecology, Mar. 24, 2011,
http://www.ecy.wa.gov/news/2011/091.html
.

p. 124

synthetic compounds in the environment: Royte,
Bottlemania
, 127–129.

p. 124

ultraviolet light, reverse osmosis: Glennon,
Unquenchable
, 169.

p. 125

extend to private well water: Glennon, Ibid., 71.

p. 125

not a single chemical: This section is drawn from a series of articles in the
New York Times
by Charles Duhigg, “That Tap Water is Legal but May be Unhealthy”
New York Times
, Dec. 16, 2009. The contaminants are listed at
http://water.epa.gov/drink/contaminants/basicinformation/index.cfm
.

p. 125

violated key provisions: Charles Duhigg, “Millions in U.S. Drink Dirty Water, Records Show,”
New York Times
, Dec. 8, 2009.

p. 126

“the level of enforcement activity”: Ibid.

p. 126

“dumping poisons into streams”: Ibid.

p. 127

bacteria, nitrates, and phosphates: Charles Duhigg, “Health Ills Abound as Farm Runoff Fouls,”
New York Times
, Sept. 17, 2009.

p. 127

Fracking diagram.
http://www.epa.gov/hfstudy/pdfs/overview-fact-sheet.pdf
.

p. 128

national gas from overseas: Marianne Lavelle, “Natural as stirs Hope and Fear in Pennsylvania,”
National Geographic
, Oct. 13, 2010.

p. 128

fracking could satisfy the nation’s need: Abrahm Lust-garten, “Scientific Study Links Flammable Drinking Water to Fracking,” ProPublica,
http://www.propublica.org/article/scientific-study-links-flammable-drinking-water-to-fracking
.

p. 128

Any ray of hope here: Ibid.

p. 129

methane seepage in water wells: Letter to Cabot Oil & Gas Corporation, available at ProPublica,
http://s3.amazonaws.com/propublica/assets/methane/pdep_nov_cabot_090227.pdf
.

p. 129

“lifted clear off the ground”: Abrahm Lustgarten, “Officials in Three States Pin Water Woes on Gas Drilling,” ProPublica, Apr. 26, 2009.

p. 129

natural gas drilling boom: See
http://www.gaslandthemovie.com/about-the-film
.

p. 130

distant drinking water sources: Bryan Walsh, “Another Fracking Mess for the Shale-Gas Industry,”
Time
, May 9, 2011.

p. 130

had the CEO himself drunk the fluid: Catherine Tsai, “Halliburton Executive Drinks Fracking Fluid At Conference,”
Huffington Post
, Aug. 22, 2011,
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/08/22/halliburton-executive-drinks-fracking-fluid_n_933621.html
.

p. 130
-
1

exempted fracking from coverage: Abrahm Lustgarten, “Natural Gas Drilling: What We Don’t Know,” ProPublica,
http://www.propublica.org//article/natural-gas-drilling-what-we-dont-know-1231
.

p. 131

the “Halliburton Loophole”: Editorial, “The Halliburton Loophole,”
New York Times
, Nov. 2, 2009,
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/03/opinion/03tue3.html
.

p. 131

West Virginia has one inspector: Ibid.

p. 131

a 1 in 3,333 chance: Morris,
The Blue Death
, 162.

p. 133

anthropologist Eva-Marita Rinne: Rinne, “‘Seeing is Believing,’” 278.

p. 134

more valuable than diamonds: See, e.g., Michael V. White, “Doctoring Adam Smith: The Fable of the Diamonds and Water Paradox,”
History of Political Economy
34 (2002), 659.