Radon Test High? Rid your Home of Radon
By Eleanor Divver Has your house tested high for radon? You’ve probably heard that one in three homes in Utah has elevated levels of radon, and that radon is the leading cause of lung cancer in nonsmokers. And since you care about your family’s health and safety, you’ve tested your home — and your results came in above the EPA action level
Talking Trash at DEQ
Most of us take our trash to the curb for pickup and don’t really consider where it goes after that. But did you know that the landfill that accepts your trash has to meet and maintain rigorous environmental standards to protect soils, ground water, and air? We asked Matt Sullivan, an environmental scientist with the Division of Waste Management and Radiation
Water Quality: Helping Communities Protect Their Water Quality
By Lisa Nelson, P.E. Ribbon-cutting ceremony for Coalville Wasterwater Treatment Plant On September 23, 2015, on a beautiful sunny day in the mountains of Summit County, members of Utah’s Water Quality Board, along with Trever Johnson and Duane Schmidt, current and former mayors of Coalville City, gathered together with the Coalville City Council for a ribbon-cutting ceremony to celebrate the
Radon: Silent Killer Lurks in One Out of Three Utah Homes
By Jan Poulsen, Guest Blogger We have all heard many times that smoking is the leading cause of lung cancer. But did you know that the second leading cause of lung cancer is radon gas? Each year, approximately 160,000 Americans die from lung cancer, and about 22,000 of those die from radon-induced lung cancer. My name is Jan Poulsen, and I am
Drinking Water: Boiling Water Woes
By Kim Dyches Following the recent news coverage about communities boiling their water, water customers may want to know if this contamination could have easily been prevented. The answer is YES. These contamination events were the result of a cross-connection between someone’s pressurized irrigation system and the culinary water line into their home. Contaminated water entering drinking water systems presents
Water Quality: Keeping Pollutants from Going down the (Storm) Drain
By Harry Campbell You may have noticed a lot of water rushing into storm drains during the heavy rains this past month. This storm water runoff comes from homes, city streets, parking lots, industrial facilities, and construction sites and often contains sediment, fertilizer, pesticides, oil, gasoline, pet waste, or hazardous waste. And because storm water isn’t treated, the runoff that
Ensuring Safe Drinking Water – for Utah
By Ken Bousfield It’s easy to take your safe drinking water for granted, whether it’s coming out of your kitchen faucet or the tap at your son’s Boy Scout camp. One of our jobs at the Division of Drinking Water is to conduct sanitary surveys—onsite inspections of drinking water systems—to ensure that the water they supply to you is safe to drink.
Pollution in Utah and Ozone Transport
When we talk about ozone pollution in Utah, we usually think of wintertime ozone in the Uinta Basin and summertime ozone along the Wasatch Front. What we don’t always take into account is the global nature of ozone; what we often view as a localized problem actually comes from a combination of regional, national and international pollution sources. That’s why
Getting Rid of Household Hazardous Waste
By Pat Sheehan Household hazardous waste (HHHW) is any waste produced in the home which contains hazardous substances or may pose a threat to the environment, pets and wildlife, or human health (think little children as the most immediate risk). Products containing hazardous substances are often labeled with words such as: toxic, flammable, corrosive, reactive, danger, warning, caution, flammable, explosive,