By Jesse Newman WSJ Patrick McGroarty WSJ Fri., Jan. 18, 2019 KEWAUNEE COUNTY, Wis.—Chuck Wagner has given up on drawing clean water from his faucets. When he moved, 23 years ago, to 80 acres situated between dairy farms in northeastern Wisconsin, he built a home and drilled a 123-foot well. The water tested clean, and his family drank it. Five years later, tests showed it was contaminated with bacteria and nitrates, potentially harmful and often derived from nitrogen in manure and fertilizer. The contamination increased over time, and his family now drinks bottled water. Mr. Wagner, a 68-year-old retired engineer, believes the pollutants are from the dairies next door. One of those, Kinnard Farms, keeps 7,000 Holsteins and spreads the manure on nearby fields. “Farmers are a big footprint,” says Lee Kinnard, 50, who runs the fifth-generation dairy. “I’m not going to say that what we do on the surface can’t have an impact.” U.S. farms, more productive than ever, are poisoning drinking water for rural Americans. Article Continued Below One in seven Americans drink from private wells, according to the U.S. Geological Survey. Nitrate concentrations rose significantly in 21% of regions where USGS researchers tested groundwater from 2002 through 2012, compared with the 13 prior years. The greatest increases were in agricultural areas. More recent sampling shows the pattern is continuing, at a potentially greater rate. Meanwhile, more than 16% of groundwater from wells sampled between 2002 and 2012 topped the federal nitrate limit of 10 parts per million,… [Read full story]
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