Category: Communication Office

  • Mercury in Fish: When Catch and Release Is Good for You, Too

    By Amy Dickey Editor’s Note: The recent release of metals-laden sediment from Tibble Fork Reservoir has raised concerns among anglers about heavy-metals contamination in fish in the American Fork River. The Division of Wildlife Resources (DWR) is currently collecting live fish downstream from the reservoir and will be testing them for the presence of metals…

  • Willard Spur: Resolving Conflict through Collaboration

    By Jeff Ostermiller Sometimes it’s hard for me to keep my inner cynic in check. This is particularly true during presidential elections, when the divisive nature of our political system makes compromise among differing viewpoints seem impossible. In contrast to presidential politics, our collaboration on Willard Spur embraced divergent views to help find solutions to…

  • 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…

  • 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…

  • Water Quality: Helping Communities Protect Their Water Quality

    By Lisa Nelson, P.E. 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 completion of…

  • 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…

  • 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…

  • 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…

  • 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…

  • 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…

  • 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,…

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