Tag Archives: Florida

EPA considering abandoning Floridan Aquifer?

The new water rule EPA plans to propose may be much more about all our drinking water underground in Florida and south Georgia than about anybody’s private pond.

Stacey H. Mitchell, David H. Quigley and Bryan Williamson, Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld LLP, 11 December 2018, United States: Dipping Its Toe In The Groundwater? Supreme Court Eyes Expedited Review For Clean Water Act Case,

Specifically, the Court aims to address a circuit split among the 4th, 5th and 9th Circuits in determining whether only direct discharges to “navigable waters” (rivers, lakes and other surface waters, for example) are covered or whether groundwater that is “hydrologically connected to surface water” is subject to Clean Water Act (CWA) pollution discharge requirements.2 Groundwater—that is, water held beneath the soil or in between rock structures—does not fall under CWA jurisdiction. Nevertheless, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), for many years, maintained that pollutants that flow with a direct and immediate hydrologic connection through groundwater into surface waters are properly regulated under the CWA.3 Environmentalists agree with EPA’s long-standing position, while many in industry say that the agency is reaching beyond its scope.

Surface water interchanges with groundwater all the time here in the southeast coastal plain, where we all drink with straws from the groundwater.


Figure from same USGS study as below.

This SCOTUS case appears to be related to the forthcoming EPA rule change proposal that has been all over the news lately. More from the same article: Continue reading →

Help stop sprawl in Marion County 2018-12-18

You can help protect the Rainbow River and the Withlacoochee (south) River this Tuesday. WWALS member Janet Barrow recommends:

Love Marion County? Want to keep what you love about it? Show up and support changes to the Comp Plan that will help curtail sprawl and add protections for our rural and conservation lands and waters, including protection from a toll road cutting through our area. Show up. Speak in support of the language to protect the Farmland Preservation Area and all areas to the south and west to the county lines (SW Marion County.)

When: 2PM, Tuesday, December 18, 2018

Where: Board of County Commissioners Auditorium
601 SE 25th Avenue
Ocala, Florida 34470

What: “The Marion County Board of County Commissioners to hold a Transmittal public hearing to consider the 2018 Evaluation and Appraisal Report based amendments to the Marion County Comprehensive Plan.”

Event: facebook

Julliette Falls Golf Club and Community to the north
Photo: Jim Tatum, on WWALS Southwings flight, pilot Roy Zimmer, navigator Andrea Rea, 2017-02-07.

Marion County denied the AZ Ocala Ranch development and is Continue reading →

Ask GA-EPD: tell everyone when anyone spills: petition

Update 2018-12-21: GA-EPD has started publishing online each business day a Sewage Spills Report! So that’s item 1 from the Petition. We thank GA-EPD and we await items 2 and 3.

By popular demand, here is a petition to the Georgia Environmental Protection Division (GA-EPD): Tell everyone when anyone spills.

Ask, Slides

This petition is for individuals. Organizations can still sign the Continue reading →

Florida Water Quality Testing Training, SRSP 2019-01-21

WWALS is holding Florida water quality testing training, thanks to trainer Savanna Barry of the Nature Coast Biological Station.

When: Noon (12PM), Monday, January 21, 2019

Where: Pavillion 2, Suwannee River State Park, 3631 201st Path, Live Oak, FL 32060

Event: facebook, meetup; don’t forget to RSVP.

RSVP: If you want to be trained, please let us know in advance so we can be sure to have enough materials; please use this google form.

Fee: No fee. But SRSP does charge a $5 entrance fee. Feel free to make a donation to WWALS or to join, to support our activities and our advocacy such as our Water Quality Testing Program.

Suwannee River and pavillions, SRSP

If you have been trained in Georgia, Continue reading →

Lowndes County spilled, and Valdosta spilled 14 places, most ongoing 2018-12-05

Yesterday I left a message for Lowndes County Utilities asking if they had any spills. They never called back. But they did report to GA-EPD 35,000 gallons of raw sewage spilled from Madison Highway near exit 11. I hear they sent out a press release which said it was into Bevel Creek, which flows into the Withlacoochee River near the Georgia-Florida state line.

1 Quitman, 1 Lowndes County, 14 Valdosta, Spills
Quitman, Lowndes County, and Valdosta spills, December 2-3, 2018, as reported to GA-EPD Atlanta. See also the raw data.

Just now I received this from Lowndes County:

Public Notice
December 4, 2017

The Lowndes County Utility Department experienced a sanitary sewage spill on December 3, 2018 on Madison Highway at exit 11 near I-75. Untreated sewage entered into a drainage ditch that flows to Bevel Creek. It has been estimated that approximately 35,000 gallons of untreated sewage entered into the ditch during the event and the duration of the spill lasted approximately six hours. The spill was caused due to excessive rainfall. The County is monitoring this situation and is performing all reporting requirements as required by the Georgia Environmental Protection Division and the County’s NPDES Permit. Anyone having questions or comments may contact The Lowndes County Utilities Department at 229-671-2500.

Also, in addition to the WWTP spill Valdosta told the public about, they had 13 other spills, most, like that WWTP spill, still ongoing. Merely the total raw sewage spilled from the ones they have stopped totals 126,500 gallons.

These Suwannee River Basin spills from Quitman, Lowndes County, and Valdosta were not the only spills in this time period: Continue reading →

SRWMD Board in Starke 2018-12-11

Deviating from its usual practice of meeting in Live Oak, it’s going to Starke, the Suwannee River Water Management District (SRWMD) Board, Tuesday of next week, 9AM December 11, 2018, at the Governor Charley Johns Conference Center, 1610 N. Temple Avenue, Starke, FL.

I don’t see anything on the agenda especially about Bradford County, except tacked onto the end as open to the public “Following Board Meeting”: “• Projects Tour in Starke”.

I’m guessing that refers to the tree clearing project approved as an emergency several months ago, at the request of the Bradford BOCC, due to expected rains.

According to Kevin Flavin, Project Manager and Professional Water Resources Engineer,

Projects, Tour
Follow this link for an interactive google map by WWALS.

Two stops are to Continue reading →

FPL Columbia County Solar Farm, fall 2018

East on I-10 just before I-75 southbound crosses: a 74.5 MW FPL solar farm in Columbia County, Florida, well along in construction. I don’t think any newspaper ever called the Sabal Trail fracked methane pipeline a windfall:

Continued, Newspaper
Solar photos: Carl McKinney, Lake City Reporter. Sorry I forgot who sent me this picture of the newspaper front page.

FPL PR 31 July 2018, Construction begins on FPL’s four newest solar power plants, Continue reading →

Pictures: Hike to the Dead River Sink 2018-01-27

It was a nice day for a Hike to the Dead River Sink in the Alapaha Quest on the Alapaha River Water Trail, with Practicing Geologist Dennis J. Price of Hamilton County, Florida. Here are some pictures and a Google map from Saturday, January 27, 2018.

[Almost there, 13:16:34, 30.5837666, -83.0535975]
Almost there, 13:16:34, 30.5837666, -83.0535975

You can come along when we do it again in January 2019. Continue reading →

Sign up for Water Quality Testing Training

Please sign up to volunteer to do Water Quality Testing, in either Florida or Georgia, using this google form.

https://forms.gle/WfNQEnoiv7LDBAsd8

You can help find out what is getting into our rivers, springs, and wells beyond sewage spills: fertilizer nitrates, livestock, wildlife, septic tanks, other. We also want to follow up after sewage spills, because the limited testing required by states doesn’t tell us how far the spill went.

WWALS testing trainer Gretchen Quarterman does trainings as trainees sign up. See the main Water Quality Testing web page for the next scheduled testing trainings.

Be sure to fill out the google form above so we will know how many. Be ready to test regularly after you get trained.

[Kit]
Kit

Anybody can take the training, which is free. But to test for WWALS requires being a WWALS member:

https://wwals.net/donations/

Remember to post your results in Georgia Adopt-A-Stream, and we can use them in Swim Guide.

Sign up, get trained, and then test and report. Continue reading →

Fine Craft and Arts Festival by Jefferson Arts Gallery, Monticello, FL 2018-11-17

Venturing outside our watersheds, but still inside the territory of the Suwannee River Water Management District, the WWALS booth goes to Monticello, Florida, this Saturday. Come on over!

When: 10AM-4PM, Saturday, November 17, 2018

Where: Jefferson Arts Gallery, 575 W. Washington Street, Monticello, FL

Event: facebook, meetup

Listing in the Tallahassee Democrat: Continue reading →