Our water infrastructure

In the wake of Super-Stormicane Sandy, much of the East Coast has far too much water on its hands. Yet water may be the most threatened resource for the millions of Americans affected by the storm:

The Scariest Thing About Sandy: Guarding the Water Supply

With Sandy bearing down upon us...[w]hat we all should be worrying about is plumbing. It’s not the water lashing the beaches that matters; it’s the water in your faucet and toilet.... More than email or mass transit or your favorite diner, all of urban life depends on plumbing—defined in practical terms as the effective provision of clean water for drinking and the regular removal of waste to a place nowhere near the source of clean water....

Yet most of today’s survival tips out there have only to do with keeping your food from spoiling or your ice icy.... But the problem is not one of food shortages but, alas, one of excrement. Raw sewage. Shit. In your water supply.

Flooding is the most common way a water supply can be compromised—for example, the Midwest floods of 1993 cut off my Des Moines relatives' water supply for nearly three weeks. But there is another way that the author hints at with his reference to Milwaukee's cryptosporidium outbreak of 1993: inattentiveness to our water infrastructure.

Smart meters vs. our precious bodily fluids

Reading some of the anti-smart-meter rhetoric, I've been vaguely reminded of General Ripper's speech from Dr. Strangelove. Turns out that reaction wasn't so far off:

What do we want from the Water Utility?

At Monday's Sherman Neighborhood Association meeting we had a lengthy discussion about Well 7, the city water well next to Shabazz High on Sherman Avenue. The Water Utility is planning to install an iron/managese filter, and the discussion was about whether or how this would be a prelude to boosting the well's output.

Meanwhile, the saga of the smart meters continues...

Why care about these water meters?

Reading my comments about the water meter controversy, you might be left wondering why I bother writing about it. So what if folks come across studies on the Internet that tell them radio waves cause cancer? Why shouldn't they be free to make their own choice?

It's true that I experience no harm from my neighbor not wanting a wireless meter. But the discussion on this issue -- the alarmist rhetoric, studies from a small group of 'concerned scientists,' implications of corporate greed, accusations of trampling on freedom -- has a familiar, disturbing ring to it.