Month

December 2016
15
Dec

The Dirt on Flea Control

It’s hard to go to the big box pet store and not stumble over the flea control displays. Most pet owners have dabbed or squirted Frontline or Advantage between their cat’s shoulder bones or onto the back of their dog’s neck, but who would guess this same chemical would make its way off our pet’s fur, down the drain, through wastewater treatment, and into the Bay? Apparently all the petting and shedding and subsequent washing of hands, doggies, and floors is moving flea-killing chemicals into our household wastewater, and the treatment plants aren’t getting it out again. “Sewage treatment plants were not designed to treat and remove all the industrial chemicals we are now using in our homes,” says Kelly...
Read More
15
Dec

Options for Orphan Species

Off a bustling Delta highway, next door to a branch of the California Aqueduct, sprawls a tidy collection of shipping containers, humming pumps, and cylindrical tanks. This resolutely artificial site is devoted to preserving a disappearing piece of natural California: the Delta smelt. “Our fish are a refuge population,” says Tien-Chieh Hung...
Read More
15
Dec

Urban Jungle Inspires Unique Regulatory Tack

Out of all the social and environmental costs of homelessness, the trash that blows from encampments into waterways may help spur a solution to this problem in the Bay Area. Under a new resolution by the SF Bay Regional Water Quality Control Board, trash from homeless encampments now falls under the stormwater permit that requires Bay Area cities and counties to get storm drains virtually trash-free by 2022.
Read More