Americans think of the dedicated men and women of the United States Marine Corps as protectors of the nation. It appears that for many years, however, the nation was not protecting the Marines. Starting in 1980, tests showed drinking water at Camp Lejeune in North Carolina had been highly contaminated with solvents. In the intervening decades, many Marines have been diagnosed with specific cancers that occur with much higher frequency in Marines who were based at Camp Lejeune than one would expect in the general population.

Contaminated Water and Elevated Risks
Over a period of decades, chemicals were dumped into storm drains, leaked from fuel tanks or buried in pits across the base. These chemicals seeped through the groundwater and into the wells that fed the base. When the wells were tested in the 1980’s several chemicals were identified in the drinking water at unsafe levels; in particular, the tests revealed elevated concentrations of trichloroethylene, benzene and perchloroethylene in the base’s water supply. Once discovered, the contaminated wells were taken out of service by the Marine Corps. Unfortunately, tens of thousands of Marines and their families had been previously using water from those wells.

To date, 55 Marines have been diagnosed with male breast cancer and all have connections to Camp Lejeune. Male breast cancer is so rare — fewer than 2,000 men are diagnosed each year — that the findings have raised questions among epidemiologists. Additionally, the Marines who were stationed at Camp Lejeune and their families who lived on base have a higher incidence of leukemia, non-Hodgkins’ lymphoma and other diseases.

The Marine Corps says that science has yet to show a link between Camp Lejeune’s water and families’ illnesses and a report by the National Research Council released in 2009 found no definitive cause. That said, many in the Marine Corp and now some congressmen are asking for a more complete investigation into the causes and remedies. In an effort to raise awareness and tell the story from a personal perspective, many Marines helped in the production of a motion picture that was released to American audiences in the autumn of 2011.

A New Movie Documents the Effects
Several Marines’ personal struggles with the water contamination at Camp Lejeune are captured in the documentary Semper Fi: Always Faithful. The movie tells the story of the contaminated wells and personal stories of Marines, sailors, civilians and their families stationed at the base, focusing on Jerry Ensminger, a retired Marine Master Sergeant. His daughter, Janey, who was conceived at Camp Lejeune, died in 1985 of a rare form of leukemia.

There is no question that the wells at Camp Lejeune were contaminated and, while science continues to debate the specific impact that this contamination had on the health of those who drank the water, it is reasonable to assume that the contamination played some role in the increased incidence of cancer and disease in those who lived and worked on base. These brave men and women stood strong for the United States – and it only seems appropriate that we should stand strong for them, now.

At H2Bid, we enjoy telling our readers about new challenges in water management, innovative technologies that could address the planet’s water needs and issues that relate to wastewater management. To start 2012, however, we’d like to expose our readers to a new topic – water in space. The search for water on Mars has been in the news a great deal in the pat few years with NASA’s twin rovers looking for evidence of ancient lakes and oceans on the red planet. In the context of Mars, finding water is critical to understanding if life could have once existed on Mars. Mars is only one facet in the broader search for water in space, however.

Worldwide, the major space agencies are actively looking for water in space. The reason is fairly simple: water is critical to all life, as we know it. Understanding where water exists provides scientists with a clue as to the potential frequency of life in the universe and also a roadmap to find search for that life. Beyond the academic search for life far outside our solar system, understanding where water exists in Earth’s own neighborhood allows for more freedom when it comes to human exploration of the solar system in the coming decades. If we had to take our water with us wherever we went, our journeys would likely be limited to near-Earth orbit and the moon.

In that spirit, and considerably closer to home than Mars, scientists are scouring Earth’s own moon for water. The moon is a logical staging point for future exploration and identifying resources available on or just below its surface would reduce the risk of basing humans on the moon. In 2009, NASA crashed the LCROSS lunar impact probe into a permanently-shadowed crater near the moon’s south pole. A small satellite remained in orbit to observe the impact and analyze the debris kicked up in the process. Based on these observations, NASA estimates that there are likely one billion gallons of water in that crater, alone. With several other permanently-shadowed craters dotting the moon’s surface, it’s likely that the moon holds a significant amount of water.

Scientists believe that the water has existed as ice for billions of years, possibly originating from comet strikes and other impacts. Currently the Europeans and the Japanese are joining with NASA to probe the moon further for water, metals and fuel sources that could further sustain a human presence. In addition, these same agencies are looking at asteroids for water and metals, as well. It may well be that our solar system is a much wetter location than we previously assumed it was.

A bit further out, past the moon and the asteroid belt, is Jupiter’s moon Europa. Space probes that have flown by this moon have been able to photograph and analyze Europa’s surface. Indications are that, under a layer of ice that comprises its surface, Europa may be home to a liquid-water ocean. Scientists theorize that the constant pull and tug from Jupiter’s gravity likely heats this inner ocean and lets it stay in a liquid state. NASA and other agencies are currently conceptualizing an unmanned mission to Europa to determine if a liquid ocean does exist and to probe that ocean, should it be present. Space agencies are looking at lakes buried under glaciers, such as Lake Vostok in Antarctica, as suitable testing sites for refining the probes that may eventually travel to Europa.

Even further from Earth, NASA has discovered what may be the largest, most ancient body of water in the entire universe. The water is in a cloud around a huge black hole that is in the process of sucking in matter and spraying out energy, and the waves of energy the black hole releases have been making water by mixing hydrogen and oxygen atoms together in the waves. NASA estimates that the volume of water in orbit is over 140 trillion times as much water as exists in all forms on Earth. That’s a stunning amount of water that is difficult to even imagine! This water won’t help solve Earth’s water woes, however; at 12 billion light years from our planet, it is unlikely that humans will ever visit this “ocean in space”.

While humans may never visit the ocean orbiting a black hole billions of light years from our home, the fact that such water is detectable and present does give us confidence that water may be very prevalent in our universe. The recent findings on the moon and the possibility of an ocean under Europa’s ice indicate that water may, in fact, be everywhere. If that were the case, long term human space exploration and eventual pilgrimages to the stars may become a reality instead of science fiction. In the meantime, however, there are plenty of near term problems to be solved right here, on planet Earth.

The State of Oregon recently established the strictest guidelines for water pollution in the United States. The revised standards are aimed to protect people who consume fish as a large portion of their diet. Oregon’s Native American population is partly behind the push to decrease tolerance for contaminants in water; most tribes in the area have a long tradition of fishing that predates the settling of the area by Europeans.

Oregon’s existing water quality standards are built on an assumption that people eat 17.5 grams of fish a day, relatively small amount and typical of assumptions in most states. The proposed standard increases the assumed fish consumption to 175 grams a day, typical of a diet where most protein comes from fish.

The change would significantly tighten Oregon’s human health criteria for a large number of pollutants, including mercury, flame retardants, PCBs, dioxins, plasticizers and pesticides. The stricter standards could increase the costs for industries like paper mills and for municipal sewage treatment plants, increasing consumer sewer rates. On the flipside, the new rules should also lower the health risks for those who eat large amounts local fish; it is estimated that 100,000 Oregonians, including 20,000 children have a primary diet based around fish, according to a committee set up to consider the health effects of the new standard.

In the neighboring state of Washington, environmentalists and Native Americans are taking note of the proposed Oregon law; the Lummi tribe, specifically, is advocating for similar strict clean water laws. Their position is that selecting “safe” toxin levels based on a significantly lower intake of fish compared to what the native population actually consumes defies common sense and puts their health at a disproportionate risk.

The Environmental Protection Agency has already approved Oregon’s new standards and Oregon’s Department of Environmental Quality will implement them as water quality permits come up for renewal. While some may find these new rules to be too strict, those that consume fish on a routine basis likely support the rules overwhelmingly.