Barabara Tasch reports that groundwater from two aquifers in the central U.S. contain uranium levels that are significantly higher than the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) maximum contaminant level (MCL) and may have been so a long time.
What is more, these two aquifers provide drinking water to almost 6 million people, and almost 2 million of them live less than a mile from the contaminated groundwater, according to a study lead by two researchers from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln.
The High Plains aquifer is the largest in the US - It spans from Texas to South Dakota and stretches over a total of eight states. And it not only has uranium concentrations 89 times the EPA maximum contaminant level (MCL), but it also has nitrate concentrations levels 189 times the MCL.
The California-based Central Valley aquifer has even higher concentration levels with uranium concentrations 180 times the MCL and nitrate concentration levels 34 times the MCL. The study found that 78% of the uranium-contaminated sites are linked to the presence of nitrate, a common groundwater contaminant that stems from chemical and animal waste fertilizers. Nitrate, through a series of bacterial and chemical reactions, oxidizes uranium which then makes it soluble and capable of leaching into groundwater.
The paper on which this summary is based is available here:
http://pubs.acs.org/doi/pdfplus/10.1021/acs.estlett.5b00174
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