Yes, it's the waste water left over from fracking. The
fracking liquid that contains chemicals we don't know about. This is the kind of idiocy posing as one solution to the California man-made
water crisis. Although the drought is exacerbated by climate change, the water crisis is occurring due to irresponsible farming practices. Specifically, the 47% of California water which is used for dairy factory farms, livestock production and crops used for animal feed which I wrote about
here,
here and
here. The
LA Times has the story:
in California's thirsty farm belt, where pumpjacks nod amid neat rows of crops, it's a proposition that seems to make sense: using treated oil field wastewater to irrigate crops.
Oil giant Chevron recycles 21 million gallons of that water each day and sells it to farmers who use it on about 45,000 acres of crops, about 10% of Kern County's farmland.
California seems to think it has a good thing going utilizing fracking waste water. California produces nearly
50% of all fruit and vegetables in US. Although there are other areas in US more suited to produce produce than California, California seems reluctant to cede it's production to
more suitable areas regardless of the consequences to our food supply.
Until now, government authorities have only required limited testing of recycled irrigation water, checking for naturally occurring toxins such as salts and arsenic, using decades-old monitoring standards. They haven't screened for the range of chemicals used in modern oil production.
No one knows whether nuts, citrus or other crops grown with the recycled oil field water have been contaminated. Farmers may test crops for pests or disease, but they don't check for water-borne chemicals. Instead, they rely on oversight by state and local water authorities. But experts say that testing of both the water and the produce should be expanded.
A Chevron spokesman had this to say: "Protection of people and the environment is a core value for Chevron, and we take all necessary steps to ensure the protection of our water resources,"
There, doesn't that make you feel better? I encourage you to read the entire LA Times piece, it's a stunner.
6:57 PM PT: Further research revealed that CA is probably not alone in using fracking wastewater for irrigation. From Ecowatch:
http://ecowatch.com/...
"Surface disposal of water produced by oil and gas drilling is forbidden in the Eastern U.S. but allowed in the arid West for purposes of “agricultural or wildlife propagation,” in the words of the governing federal regulation. Thus, the “produced water,” as it is called, must be “of good enough quality to be used for wildlife or livestock watering or other agricultural uses.”
Tue May 05, 2015 at 4:50 AM PT: For information regarding contamination to organic farms from nearby fracking Ecowatch has excellent article:
http://ecowatch.com/...
Organic farming vs fracking