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Septic Systems and the Climate Crisis

If your home is in a rural area in Maryland, your sinks, toilets, showers, dishwasher, and washing machine probably empty into a septic tank. How does a septic tank work? Watery waste, or effluent, is most of the waste, where anaerobic bacteria begin to break it down. The sludge, or inorganic solids which are the leftovers of bacteria digesting organic effluent, falls to the bottom of the tank. Scum which is mostly fats, grease, and oil floats to the top of the tank. A filter is present, which prevents most solids from going to the eventual draining, or leach field. The leach field releases

My Testimony to EPA about its Toxic Water Proposal

On Thursday, December 19th I participated in a "virtual" public hearing on the Trump administration's dangerous plan to let dirty power plants dump even more pollution into our rivers, putting more communities at risk. These rollbacks will impact communities across the country. Despite this, EPA decided not to host an in-person hearing on this issue, deciding instead to host the virtual hearing in the middle of the holiday season. This is not the type of meaningful engagement that communities deserve.

Below is what I told EPA. Please read it and then send a message to EPA!

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Replacing a forest with a business park?

In Abingdon in Harford County, a developer has proposed to build a new "Abingdon Business Park:" three e-commerce/warehouse facilities, four restaurants, two flex retail spaces, one hotel, one convenience store and additional flex spaces, requiring the clear-cutting of 226 acres of a 330-acre forest. While sometimes development on forested lands is necessary, the developer has not proven that the negative externalities to the public are outweighed by the benefits, or that they considered putting their project on sites that would have less of an impact on water quality.

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Perspectives on Groundwater Sustainability: Susan Harvey with North County Watch

How did you get involved with sustainable groundwater management issues?

I have been a volunteer activist in the county for 20 years. As irrigated agriculture came in and started planting in the region it started to become obvious that we needed to pay attention to how much groundwater there was. In 2005, the County published a study they’d done of the groundwater aquifer and they published a second one in 2009 or 2010, and then a third one. As irrigated agriculture grew and we faced this drought, residents’ wells started to go dry. In the residential area within the Paso Robles basin (800

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