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Mtcarmelregister - News
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Boron levels in city water supply not excessive, testing indicates
Posted: Friday, Sep 07, 2007 - 03:17:02 pm EDT
 | | City water tested daily
Mary Duckett, an employee of the City of Mt. Carmel Water Department, tests the city’s water supply once a day. She tests not only the well water, but the treated water as well. Duckett also will test water from certain approved areas in the city. She said certain test results are sent to the State of Illinois on a monthly basis while other tests are sent in on a quarterly basis. (Staff photo by Bob Livingston)
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City’s water wells situated along river across from Gibson Generating Station
BY PHIL GOWER - Register Editor
The City of Mt. Carmel was notified in a telephone call to the mayor, City Administrative Assistant Merle Weems confirmed Thursday, of water sampling currently now being conducted by Duke Energy’s Gibson Generating Station in East Mt. Carmel, Ind.
Then in a public announcement, Duke Energy spokesperson Angeline Protogere indicated water wells are being sampled to determine boron content in the East Mt. Carmel neighborhood near Gibson Station. In the statement published Thursday by Tri-State Media newspapers, the utility spokesperson said the sampling is being conducted this week as part of the utility’s voluntary study of potential environmental impacts of coal ash stored on site at man-made ponds on the power plant property.
That notification caused Mt. Carmel water superintendent Rob Windes Thursday to review boron tests conducted by the city’s water department on “finished water” in the past 10 years.
Those tests all were “quite a bit less” than generally believed health risk limits of boron in ground water. Windes said the groundwater standard of 2,000 micrograms/liter is considered excessive.
In Mt. Carmel, the average concentration of boron levels in city water has been 78.8 micrograms/liter, Windes said of the reports carried out from December 1997 through July 2006. A “peak” or maximum concentration reading was detected by Mt. Carmel Water Department on Nov. 7, 2000, and that was 240 micrgrams/liter.
Three water wells situated along the Wabash River across from the Gibson Station location are the sole source of water for the City of Mt. Carmel. Windes said each of those three wells are drilled to about 50 or 60 ft. depth.
Windes said he spoke with an Illinois environmental official in Springfield Thursday who advised that the Wabash River should be “an effective barrier” to boron contamination from the utility plant site.
Boron is a chemical element, often found in rock and soil, which can reach ground water from atomospheric depostion of coal combustion products and storage or disposal of coal ash, as well as from consumer products such as farm fertilizers, the state of Minnesota’s Pollution Control Agency explains in a detailed report, “Boron in Minnesota’s Ground Water.”
If test results in East Mt. Carmel warrant, Duke Energy will offer residents bottled water at the company’s expense and find a long-term solution so that using bottled water is only temporary, said Duke Energy environmental scientist Jim Meiers. “We will do our best to minimize any inconveniences and stay in regular contact with those affected.”
Lab studies of animals with high, sustained doses of boron have been associated with reproductive and fetal development issues, but boron exposure is not believed to cause cancer, according to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry (ATSDR)
According to the ATSDR, ingesting large amounts of boron over short periods of time can harm the stomach, intestines, liver, kidney and brain. The registry says breathing moderate levels of boron irritates the nose, throat and eyes. The chemical has been found in at least 142 of 1,416 national priorities list sites identified by the EPA.
For more information about boron, contact the ATSDR Information Center at 1-888-422-8737.
Gibson Generating Station is located on Indiana Highway 64, about 12 miles west of Princeton, on the banks of the Wabash River. From the west, Gibson is about a mile east of Mt. Carmel.
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