The News Review:

- The Devil’s Cookroom
- … SEAWATER BECOMES TAP WATER: DESPITE HIGH COST, OCEAN…
- Identify local water sources, town panchayats directed
- Water-supply proposals resurfacing: Pipeline may be gaining on…

The Devil’s Cookroom
Jamaica Observer – Jun 3, 2007
I said “The water supplies of Kingston and most of southern Jamaica are already contaminated by bauxite wastes. I blame no one but myself for the error, which happened when I was editing what I had written. In a reply published last week, entitled ‘Not True, Mr Maxwell’ the head of the Water Resources Authority, Mr Basil Fernandez, attempts to drop a nuclear bomb on what I said…
The Porus wells, which are operated by the NWC, report low sodium concentration of. The real question about all these figures is – what level of alkalinity represents ‘contamination’? For Mr Fernandez and other water engineers, ‘contamination’ is probably a numerical threshold, whereas for ordinary people like me contamination is contamination, whether in trace amounts or greater. I personally would welcome Mr Fernandez and the Water Resources Authority clearing up this matter for us. I will remind you of what I wrote in December, which would have given Mr Fernandez a fairly accurate idea of my mindset:”I believe that bauxite mining is an unmitigated disaster and I believe that before we are reduced to the status of Nauru we should demand answers from the Government and the bauxite companies and from independent experts, to measure the cost and benefits to Jamaica of what I consider a depraved and uncivilised undertaking. “To summarise – Bauxite mining:. Is destroying social cohesion and community, disrupting families and pushing our youth towards criminality;. Is destroying the landscape of Jamaica, after our people – our major asset;.

… SEAWATER BECOMES TAP WATER: DESPITE HIGH COST, OCEAN…
Free with registration – San Jose Mercury News – AccessMyLibrary.com – Jun 3, 2007
And this week, a two-inch endangered fish shut down the pumps at California’s largest drinking water source, San Francisco Bay’s delta. Samuel Taylor Coleridge’s famous line about the ocean — “water, water everywhere, nor any drop to drink” — has always been true in California. But with so many challenges facing the state’s water supply, more people than ever are looking to the sea for a solution. Although 10 years ago there were none, today 20 desalination projects are on the drawing board in California’s coastal areas from San Diego to Marin County, including one of the largest desalination plants in the world proposed for the Bay Area. Filtering salty ocean water into drinkable fresh water is expensive. And environmental challenges loom. But groundbreaking on several facilities may start within two years.

Identify local water sources, town panchayats directed
Hindu – Jun 3, 2007
In some town panchayats, full supply is not maintained regularly. The State Government has mooted a proposal to create an underground sewer system in the suburban areas. So, as a first step, the town panchayats have been directed to identify local water resources so that the supply could be raised to the level of 135 lpd. A direction has been issued to the chairpersons of Kundrathur, Mangadu, Pallikaranai, Thiruneermalai, Sembakkam, Nandambakkam, Perungalathur, Sozhinganallur, Madambakkam, Perungudi, Peerkankaranai, Chitlapakkam and Meenambakkam town panchayats, at a meeting chaired by Collector Pradeep Yadav at the Collectorate here recently. They have a been urged to create awareness about the advantages of segregating waste at source itself.

Water-supply proposals resurfacing: Pipeline may be gaining on…
Free with registration – Lexington Herald Leader – AccessMyLibrary.com – Jun 3, 2007
The company anticipates that sometime later this year, probably in August, it will hit an all-time record 73 million gallons in a day. In a little more than a dozen years, the peaks could be over 80 million gallons — more than the company’s two Lexington treatment plants can manage, running flat out. Here we are in 2007, and the future of the region’s water supply still is in doubt, just as it’s been for decades. Various proposals — high dams on the Kentucky River, new reservoirs, a pipeline from Louisville, a new treatment plant — have come and gone. A couple are coming around again. Now the region’s growth, the ever-present possibility of a devastating drought and the fear that a parched browngrass could bring global embarrassment during the 2010 Alltech FEI World Equestrian Games, are adding extra urgency to finding a water-supply solution. The next seven months could tell.