Are the beverages you drink acidic?

The other day in class we discussed some of the issues surrounding pH and its effects on water.  Clearly, a slightly lower or higher pH in an environment can have huge effects on the natural world.  This fact got me to thinking about the liquids we consume on a daily basis, and whether or not the acidity of these beverages affects our bodies in harmful ways.  Although I could not find out this specific information, I did come across this interesting article and table with pH levels of different commercial drinks.  

According to the author, "alkalizing" your body is one of the best things you can do for your health!  Your body wants to have a pH of around 7.3, which is slightly alkaline.  Because your body is 70% water, it is very important to not only keep hydrated, but also to drink alkaline beverages.    

Check the table out! Does any of this surprise you?

See the full article here: http://www.justgoodenergy.com/2009/09/11/is-your-bottled-water-acidic/

Raiding the Bread Basket: Use and Abuse of the Mississippi River Basin

As a society, we always think about our carbon footprint, but what about our "water footprint"?  The Mississippi River basin and watershed in the U.S. is one of the most productive farming regions in the world: indeed, almost 40% of corn grown in the world comes from this area.  Also grown are soy, wheat, cotton, and others.  Think about how often you use these products. In the morning, you eat cereal made from midwestern corn, and you put on cotton clothes.  Your car is partly fueled by ethanol, and your dinner of chicken and rice is also from this area.  The problem is that pollution is affecting the water so bad, if current trends continue, the future looks grim.  

Phosphorous fertilizer costs next to nothing for farmers, but just one speck per gallon can cost society millions in lost recreational value and cleanup costs.  Rice in Arkansas has depleted the groundwater, dropping the local aquifer by  90ft.  A "dead zone" the size of Connecticut served as a study that found that oxygen-deprived female fish developed testes.  

Solutions to this pressing issue are not simple.  For example, if winter rye was planted after harvesting corn or soybeans, the rye would absorb nitrogen so it wouldn't leach into the soil and end up polluting the Gulf of Mexico.  When the rye is tilled, it would provide nitrogen for the soil.  But heavy nitrogen fertilizers are cheaper.  One man believes economic incentives need to kick in before changes are feasible.  What do you think?  

Also, check out this link to calculate your own water footprint: http://environment.nationalgeographic.com/environment/freshwater/water-footprint-calculator/  

You can find the full article here: http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2012/01/120123-mississippi-river-basin/

Does Fracking Lead to Groundwater Contamination?

Fracking, or hydraulic fracturing, is the process of extracting natural grass from rock layers deep within the earth. According to a recent article, this process very commonly causes earthquakes and also may be linked to increasing groundwater contamination and air pollution. The 2010 documentary, Gasland,  illuminated many of the problems associated with the fracking process and its effect on groundwater. Near the end of the trailer for the documentary (at 2:23), you can even see a man set his tap water on fire! An increase in air pollution may also be seen due to more methane being released into the environment. Although fracking has been a very successful method to obtain natural gas and oil from the Earth, I feel that the negative effects that this process may have on the environment and human health must be reconsidered, despite the claims made from industries that fracking has no adverse affects.

Methane Contamination of Groundwater

In Rachel Carson's Silent Spring, she discussed the negative impacts of pesticides leaching into groundwater.  The negative impacts were mainly seen by their effects on biological systems in the 1960s.  However, currently there is a rising controversy lately over the natural gas industry.  This article describes the recent litigation arising from claims that "fracking" or the extraction of natural gas has led to an increase in methane contamination of groundwater.  As this groundwater is used for drinking, and other daily needs, the controversy has risen over whether this can be proven for a fact or not.

Is Sewage Water the New Solution?

This week in Silent Spring we read about the harmful effects of pesticides in water and how this is creating a shortage of clean water for use. According to some people, one way to try solve this water shortage is to recycle waste water from such places like sinks, showers, and toilets. Recycling these waste waters is believed to be one of the better options available right now because it is cheaper than some other possibilities. Obviously one main issue is that, even though the recycled water would clean enough to drink, people do not want to use recycled waste water, whether it is to water their plants or to take a shower in.

Chemical Analysis of Sediments in Tecolote Canyon

Starting in the beginning of the World War Two period, many organochlorine pesticides were created to replace inorganic pesticides to reduce the amount of pesticide sprayed and to target specific pests as the specificity of these new pesticides increased.  Thus, as less total pesticide was sprayed, it was thought that these organochlorine pesticides would have a lesser negative on the environment and ecological systems as a whole.  Here is just one example of how these new organochlorine pesticides were used.  However, these organochlorine pesticides were found to have high persistence levels and would take extremely long to breakdown.  While these pesticides remained in the environment they continued to induce negative effects to humans and the environment, such as being known carcinogens, contaminating ground water, and bioaccumulating to toxic levels in the fatty tissues of organisms.  Some examples of these persistent organochlorine pesticides are DDT, heptachlor, aldrin, dieldrin, mirex, and chlordane. 


Chlordane was used in San Diego, California until it was banned in 1988, and was primarily used to eliminate termites.  Thus, “today, people receive the highest exposure to chlordane from living in home that were treated with chlordane for termites” (Chlordane).  Also recent findings have shown that it remains to be present in Tecolote Canyon sediments.  Due to chlordane’s low polarity, it is found in highest concentrations in organic soil and sediments.  Testing of these sediments in 2005, 2007, and 2010 have illustrated the presence of chlordane within sediments in the canyon and Mission Bay, where Tecolote Creek empties.  Due to the historical presence of chlordane in sediments in Tecolote Canyon, University of San Diego students enrolled in Environmental Chemistry under the guidance of Dr. David O. De Haan sampled and tested sediments this year for the presence of chlordane.  Chlordane was spatially variable between all of the sampling sites, with the highest values found within Mission Bay.  However, as the chlordane was found in the sediment, other physical and chemical properties (water content, organic matter content, calcium carbonate content, pH level, and sediment particle size) of the sediments were analyzed to determine any potential correlations these factors might have with the retention of chlordane at these sampling sites. 

Overall chlordane concentration levels at all sampling sites did not appear to show any definitive correlations with any of the physical and chemical parameters analyzed, as positive and negative correlations were found between chlordane concentrations and each physical and chemical factor (See Table).  Thus, it could not be said with much certainty from the analysis if any of these physical or chemical factors were a factor in the retention of chlordane in Tecolote sediments.  While these results were inconclusive and indicate the need for repeated sampling and testing to achieve the goal of this experimental design, other sources of error could have led to these inconclusive results, such as other minerals being present in the sediment, as well as the oxidation of samples from their open-air storage.  Therefore, from these inconsistent results, the physical and chemical factors are not likely to be the primary factors in the retention of chlordane in the sediments in Tecolote Canyon.

Margin of Exposure

In Western Australia, the margin of exposure for various heavy metals and other pollutants that have been banned for over 40 years has been found to be lower in mothers-to-be.  Many pregnant mothers have been found with elevated levels of cadmium, mercury, and uranium in their blood.  This is especially disturbing as the direct effects on the unborn fetuses are reportedly unknown at this time.  High concentrations of these toxins can affect child mental development, as well as potentially increase the cancer risk in these newborns.  This article describes these recent findings in Western Australia.