New report finds Chromium-6 in USA drinking water

But this new analysis from the Environmental Working Group, an independent advocacy group, examines evidence from water systems throughout the nation and concludes that the tap water of 218 million Americans contains levels of chromium-6 that the group considers unsafe.

Risky levels of chromium-6 are contaminating tap water consumed by hundreds of millions of Americans, according to a national report released Tuesday. Sixteen years after the film “Erin Brockovich” brought worldwide attention to chemical pollution in Hinkley, California, two-thirds of Americans are still at risk from the risky heavy metal.

California is the only state in the nation that regulates the amount of chromium-6 in drinking water, at a rate of 10 parts per billion.

New Jersey still uses the federal standard of 100 parts per billion of “total chromium” in drinking water, which includes both toxic hexavalent chromium and its benign cousin trivalent chromium. But there are no national regulations for the compound-and the chemical industry is trying to keep it that way. Pala, with the highest levels in the county, at.49 parts per billion, represents a risk of about 25 additional cancer cases per million. The two main types are chromium-3, an essential human nutrient considered to be mostly harmless, and chromium-6, which has always been known to cause lung cancer when airborne particles are inhaled. The EPA has put 81 compounds on that list since 1996 but has only set new limits for one, said Bill Walker, the managing editor at Environmental Working Group. At that time, the causal relationship between hexavalent chromium and cancer was already known, and even small exposure levels were proven to be unsafe to humans.

“But in 2014, after aggressive lobbying by industry and water utilities, the state regulators adopted a legal limit 500 times the public health goal“.

The city of Cleveland ranked 15th in average level of chromium-6 in the largest USA water systems, averaging.102 parts per billion. In response to the study results, Erin Brockovich herself is back to demand more regulatory action to ensure clean, healthy drinking water.

The advocacy group’s determination was based on California’s public health goal of 0.02 parts per billion, an NJ Advance Media article reports – though California’s actual legal standard is 10 parts per billion.

A new study says the carcinogen is in the tap water of 200 million Americans.

“In terms of cancer studies, that is the gold standard of animal studies”, said David Andrews, co-author of the report and a senior scientist with the Environmental Working Group.

Chromium-6 occurs naturally in the environment, but high quantities are also produced by industrial projects.

The authors of the EWG report said they did not study why the levels are higher in some cities than others and that it would be hard to extrapolate where the pollution is coming from based on the data they used.

The 0.02 PPB “public health goal” is the level below which California’s state scientists believe there is no more than a one-in-a-million risk of a person developing cancer over their lifetime.

The San Diego Union-Tribune: Is Chromium In Drinking Water A Health Risk? .

Glendale is already setting aside money in anticipation that the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency will mandate a new limit for chromium-6, he said. It breaks down the levels of contamination not only by county, but by individual water system.

“They’re out to lunch”, Naeyaert said of the 0.02 ppb goal.