School Science Projects Reveal Very High Lead Levels in the Schools' Water (theguardian.com) 63
650 U.K. schools received educational kits from a charity for testing the lead levels in their water. Students at more than 14 schools then discovered their drinking water had higher lead levels than the recommended maximum. The Guardian reports:
Several schools reported levels of lead at 50 micrograms per litre — five times the maximum allowed. Even low levels of lead are toxic and can reduce children's IQ and damage their nervous system... The charity conducted its own tests on samples returned by 81 schools and has confirmed that 14 samples have lead above 50 micrograms per litre, with several more showing signs of elevated levels.
The charity is now contacting the schools to alert them and filtration firm Aquaphor, which co-sponsored the project, said it would supply free water filters to affected schools.
"One of the frustrations of most school science is that it doesn't have any significance," writes Slashdot reader. "This is a story of one that revealed that lead levels were far higher than everyone was assuming..."
A spokesperson for the Department of Environment Food and Rural Affairs told the Guardian that "If a school becomes aware they have lead pipework or have a test which has failed for lead, they should contact their local water company who will be required to enforce the removal of the lead pipe by the owner of the building."
The charity is now contacting the schools to alert them and filtration firm Aquaphor, which co-sponsored the project, said it would supply free water filters to affected schools.
"One of the frustrations of most school science is that it doesn't have any significance," writes Slashdot reader. "This is a story of one that revealed that lead levels were far higher than everyone was assuming..."
A spokesperson for the Department of Environment Food and Rural Affairs told the Guardian that "If a school becomes aware they have lead pipework or have a test which has failed for lead, they should contact their local water company who will be required to enforce the removal of the lead pipe by the owner of the building."
owner of the building?? and if the state owns it? (Score:3)
owner of the building?? and if the state owns it? well need to X2 taxes to pay for an RUSH fix
Re:owner of the building?? and if the state owns i (Score:4)
School districts are more likely to float bonds to fund the RUSH fix and then pay them off over time, thus leading to very small tax increases, if any.
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Over here, if the state (city, county, etc.) owns it, it won't be fixed.
Anecdote: A friend of mine was looking for some commercial property it which to locate her business. She told me that there was a 'cute' little brick building, sitting unused, in her neighborhood which belonged to the city. And she wondered if they might be persuaded to part with it. I informed her that it was an old electric substation and was probably heavily contaminated with transformer oil, PCBs and other stuff. And due to regulat
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Anecdote: A friend of mine was looking for some commercial property it which to locate her business. She told me that there was a 'cute' little brick building, sitting unused, in her neighborhood which belonged to the city. And she wondered if they might be persuaded to part with it. I informed her that it was an old electric substation and was probably heavily contaminated with transformer oil, PCBs and other stuff. And due to regulations involving cleanup and hazard disclosure upon sale, the city would never transfer ownership. I was right. They converted it into a community daycare center (still city owned, exempt from the aforementioned requirements).
This sounds like the kind of story that an investigative reporter would be all over. I'm not doubting you, but a confirming citation would be interesting. I tried, but couldn't find one. Can you help?
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Can you help?
Let's think about that. A city that is proudly a bastion of left wing group think. Call them out on one of their stupid mistakes and they will spare no expense to find the individuals responsible. Starting with my friend (who has contacted the city regarding the sale of surplus substation property). She now has a business location and won't be happy about the city's brown shirts tagging and vandalizing her storefront [wikipedia.org].
Re:owner of the building?? and if the state owns i (Score:5, Insightful)
Can you help?
Let's think about that. A city that is proudly a bastion of left wing group think. Call them out on one of their stupid mistakes and they will spare no expense to find the individuals responsible. Starting with my friend (who has contacted the city regarding the sale of surplus substation property). She now has a business location and won't be happy about the city's brown shirts tagging and vandalizing her storefront [wikipedia.org].
Well that's not much help at all. In fact you seem quite confused about left-wing and right-wing, to the point that I question the veracity of your anecdote.
Historically, the conservative right (not the progressive left) have been far more likely to show an indifference to environmental issues at all political levels, from the municipal to the international. Yet you claim the hush-up about the substation-now-daycare was due to "left wing group think." You provide no evidence because you claim that doing so would "out" your friend. Color me skeptical. Again, such a municipal misdeed should have been covered in the media. Yet I can find no references.
Your combination of an allusion to Nazi (right-wing) "brown shirts" with a backing citation to Soviet (left-wing) "Red Terror" is either disingenuous or sloppy. Both are extreme and both are bad, but they're not the same. And are you really claiming that "brown shirts" (whatever their allegiance) will descend on your friend's now-functioning storefront just because she inquired about the availability of a seemingly-disused city property? Color me double-skeptical.
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Well that's not much help at all.
...
Historically, the conservative right (not the progressive left) have been far more likely to show an indifference to environmental issues at all political levels
I suspected that this was your position. As such, I had no intention of 'helping' you identify anyone informing on the government.
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Why are you hiding the location where this is happening? Even the city and state would be a nice start. It is very suspicious that you would make such a claim and then refuse to say where it's happening. I didn't learn a whole lot at school, but one thing that did stick is that when you make a claim, you need to back it up with evidence. Your reaction and refusal to provide even the slightest bit of proof makes me think that you're full of crap, but I believe that any entity (public or private) that would p
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owner of the building?? and if the state owns it? well need to X2 taxes to pay for an RUSH fix
Is RUSH fix the name of a program?
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If Rush is too expensive, they could try The Guess Who or Steppenwolf.
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At least with the alternative bands, the bass line will be a bit more melodic and a lot less spasmodic.
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owner of the building?? and if the state owns it? well need to X2 taxes to pay for an RUSH fix
The majority of UK schools aren't "state-owned" any more - not since control was taken from local councils (along with more than a £billion in building title deeds) and handed to so-called "Academy" companies a few years back.
No prizes for guessing what gets priority therefore - making a bigger profit, or performing building maintenance to make sure that pupils are protected from (in this case) lead in the pipes...
Suspecting it's more than just a few schools (Score:1)
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Several schools reported levels of lead at 50 micrograms per litre â" five times the maximum allowed. Even low levels of lead are toxic and can reduce children's IQ
How would they be able to tell whether it was caused by lead in the water or the effects of the DfE's latest education mass social experiment?
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Since actually cleaning all that lead-oxide dust out of cities is likely to be expensive, it is quite difficult to get funding to actually investigate the psychological effects of the lead poisoning. The distribution of lead has been well established.
Follow the money (Score:1)
This smelled so much like a study biased to sell something that I was looking around for who the hell funded it - possibly Coca Cola or Pepsi to sell bottled water or fizzy drinks to schools.
I didn't have to look for long, as this helpful bit is provided in the blurb:
filtration firm Aquaphor, which co-sponsored the project
Riiiight...
Re:Follow the money (Score:4, Informative)
A Conspiracy!! You found it!! Quick contact Fox Spews!!
A modest amount of clicking two links, one to the Guardian article and one to the link provided show that the study was indeed the brainchild of
https://www.donhansoncharitabl... [donhansonc...dation.org]
which is a charity organization. So say you are Don Hanson and you want to check on lead levels in schools. You need to fund the study somehow. Do you (1) figure out how to construct lead testing kits or (2) go to an organization which knows how to test lead levels and might be willing to pay for it? I numbered the choices so you wouldn't get confused. And the company didn't do the testing, the school kids did.
Re:Follow the money (Score:4, Insightful)
Every year I get a letter in the mail about the availability of a water report. I've never bothered to actually look at it since the water quality where I live is good, but unless I were to suspect the government of lying about it's own findings what would warrant going through the effort?
Granted it's a a cool science project and something that I probably would have found fascinating as a kid. Too bad someone apparently needed an axe to grind in order to fund a fun science project.
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Isn't the state supposed to be doing this regularly?
Does Flint, Michigan ring a bell?
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Irregular testing wasn't Flint's problem.
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Isn't the state supposed to be doing [testing] regularly?
Does Flint, Michigan ring a bell?
Irregular testing wasn't Flint's problem.
Indeed. Flint knew already that they had lead pipes, and that there would be a problem when they changed water-sources. But they changed anyway. [wikipedia.org]
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I'm still not sure. It sounds like a conspiracy but I can't find any badly illustrated YouTube videos about it. Is it "something 'they' don't want me to know"? That would confirm it for sure.
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I'm still not sure. It sounds like a conspiracy but I can't find any badly illustrated YouTube videos about it.
That proves it's a conspiracy, look at how well they've suppressed all the evidence!
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Quick contact Fox Spews!!
This is the UK we're talking about. Fox Spews has nothing on The Daily Flail, who no doubt will somehow find a way to blame the EU for the water quality.
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It is marketing genius - but they are doing the schools a solid and providing them with free filters.
I bet they sell an awful lot of filters now though to other people who will be more aware and more worried about heavy metal and other water contaminants.
Overall, I think I can't really fault this.
Re:Follow the money (Score:4, Funny)
Hello fellow lead pipe user.
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Oh yes, the conspiracy to give away free filters to the schools with high lead in the water to not only raise awareness of these things, but also get some cheap PR. The god DAMNED HORROR !!
Quit getting high off your own piss and unclench your anus, it's cutting off blood flow to your few remaining brain cells.
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What exactly about this looks like a study to sell something?
1) They are not showing any benefit from any product. Most fake studies claim some ridiculous benefit from a product. X will make you live longer, get laid, get rich, get thin, get rid of Y, etc. None of that, no solution discussed at all.
2) They are talking about something that, if it is true AND the people were responsible, would be fixed by the school not by selling anything. But schools are not tempted by studies they read about online.
3)
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This smelled so much like a study biased to sell something that I was looking around for who the hell funded it - possibly Coca Cola or Pepsi to sell bottled water or fizzy drinks to schools.
I didn't have to look for long, as this helpful bit is provided in the blurb:
filtration firm Aquaphor, which co-sponsored the project
Riiiight...
So are you claiming that the lead tests were bogus or what?
Seems like finding out if there is poison in public water might be a good thing to do even if a water company is involved. And I thought I was cynical.
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I didn't have to look for long, as this helpful bit is provided in the blurb:
filtration firm Aquaphor, which co-sponsored the project
Riiiight...
Read on. Common. To the end of the sentence you quoted. Tell us how providing test kits for free and subsequently providing free filtration fits into you conspiracy.
This all smells of BigLedFiltration slowly taking over our democracy!!!! Someone should call the Daily Mail right now so they can blame the EU for it.
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Simple - company wants more customers. Gets a non-profit to do the hunting for them. Finds dozens of schools (or more). Swoops in and gives them all free filtration assemblies. Did that include replacement filters for ever? I don't think so. Now company has lots more industrial sized customers - already locked into needing THEIR filters.
That's my cynical take on it.
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UK Schools (Score:5, Interesting)
I work in UK schools.
I'll tell you that this means that the schools themselves will end up removing educational provision to replace those pipes. That's why they don't test - they aren't required to, and if they do test they know exactly what will happen.
I'll also tell you that every UK school I've ever worked in has asbestos in it. Sure, it can be contained, etc. and is required to be monitored. But the fact is that the only way to get rid of it is to remove it at incredible expense, and then rebuild the things you had to destroy to get to it (walls, ceilings, etc.) from scratch. And the SCHOOL would be paying for that, out of the same budget allocations that everything else comes out of. You want to spend £100k removing the asbestos? Cool, no new computers this year, and by the way we're putting up lunch costs, and decreasing after-school provision.
So they just don't do it.
I'm not defending that, but the way these things are done, the government doesn't care and isn't going to give you the money to resolve this specifically, they're going to give you the same amount of money as last year, possibly less once inflation is taken account of, and it's up to the school to sort it out. So the one school that has been around long enough to have lead pipes and asbestos classrooms ends up being "worse" than the school that didn't have those, and their results drop, which means they lose funding AND kids, and before you know it you have an even crappier school, struggling even more, and with the same problems.
If you want lead out of school water, make the government enforce it and provide funds specifically for this. No lead pipes? No funds for it.
Same for asbestos.
And never drill through any wall or ceiling in a school yourself.
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The government isn't going to do anything. Look at the people with dangerous cladding on their apartments. Look at the paltry amount offered to help kids catch up after the pandemic.
Is the cladding the government's responsibility? (Score:2)
Every time we hear of another building with 'dangerous' cladding, it becomes clearer that the actual risk is not very much. Grenfell was a disaster not only because of the cladding, but because a number of other safety features had been lost over the years, AND the fire brigade got it badly wrong.
As to taxpayer responsibility? Where it is possible to identify a builder who an be held responsible, then they should be made to pay for the repairs. The only real issue is where no other source of funding can be
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The builders are major Tory donors so won't be paying anything. The return on their investment is excellent.
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Don't compare it with asbestos. As long as you don't touch it, it's mostly fine. 5 times the maximum lead in the drinking water in the other hand, unless no kid is drinking it, is doing harm every day.
Re:UK Schools (Score:4, Informative)
Don't compare it with asbestos. As long as you don't touch it, it's mostly fine. 5 times the maximum lead in the drinking water in the other hand, unless no kid is drinking it, is doing permanent harm to childrens' brains every day.
FTFY. Not that your post needed much fixing, of course.
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I'll also tell you that every UK school I've ever worked in has asbestos in it.
Asbestos and lead in drinking water are two very different things with very different risks to people. Often construction activities to remove Asbestos increase the risk of exposure to asbestos than simply leaving it alone and making sure it's undisturbed.
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Asbestos does nothing if contained and inert. So you don't need to tear everything down, but just take precautions.
It can be used everywhere, wall insulation, paints, or even the ground. But adding thick enough separation, especially in bright warning colors can do the trick: https://www.jaybro.com.au/mast... [jaybro.com.au]
Lead in water? Is very hard to contain safely. The good option is replacing everything. But you can to add layers of epoxy resin inside the main pipes: https://www.nuflowtechnologies... [nuflowtechnologies.com]
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Lead in water? Is very hard to contain safely.
Not hard. You either reduce acidity before it hits the old pipes, or filter it afterward. Neither is hard.
But nor is it hard to do it properly, bypass the old lead pipes with new plastic ones for drinking and cooking water.
Unlike asbestos, you can leave the old pipes in place.
The only hard part is the bureaucracy: suspending mountains of building regulations so, e.g. pipes can be left exposed on walls or ceilings until the next major refurb, and not have to wait months for permits.
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Thanks, I should probably have said "very hard to do in a disciplined way for a long time".
For example, the Flint water crisis would have never happened if they continued to use phosphate. But they let water became acidic over time:
https://cen.acs.org/articles/9... [acs.org]
Water filters do also become ineffective over time due to disrepair. They can even start hosting mold and be counter productive instead of helping.
Yes, living alongside lead pipes can happen. But it requires active care.
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Copper Pipes (Score:1)
Re: Copper Pipes (Score:2)
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No, copper pipes are soldered with a tiny amount of silver, which is cheaper than a screw on coupling, which is the other choice.
Older copper water pipes are soldered with tin/lead. Newer installations are required to be lead free. Composition is usually 95 percent tin - 5 percent Antimony.
Silver bearing solder can certainly be used to solder copper pipes, but at least here i the US it's generally the Tin/Antimony variety.
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No, copper pipes are soldered with a tiny amount of silver, which is cheaper than a screw on coupling, which is the other choice.
Older copper water pipes are soldered with tin/lead. Newer installations are required to be lead free. Composition is usually 95 percent tin - 5 percent Antimony.
Silver bearing solder can certainly be used to solder copper pipes, but at least here i the US it's generally the Tin/Antimony variety.
Wow - tough crowd tonight - Someone thinks my info on solder was over-rated?
Sometimes they don't think it be like that, but it do! 8^)
FTFY (Score:2)
info tid bit (Score:2)
a lead pipe is not as dangerous as people think.
If the water in the pipe is alkaline lead wont leach into the water as much. Water that has a lower ph will leach the lead out of the pipes and cause dangerous levels of lead in the water.
That is what happened in Flint, the lead in the pipes didn't cause a problem while the water in them had a high Lime content. It was after the source of the water was changed and the new source was acidic that the lead levels rose.
Sponsored by Aquapor (Score:2)
Dubious (Score:3)
I worked in a water testing lab for a number of years. I'm inclined to bet that the test the kids were using was some kind of strip you dip in the water and you match the colour on a chart. Reasonably good for stuff like pH and hardness but I can't possibly see how this would give accurate results for metals at the microgram level.
At that level only techniques like atomic absorbtion spectroscopy can give accurate and verifiable results. In the UK, if you have lead pipes and are concerned over the quality of your water, you can call your supplier and they will test it for free. No mention in the article if that was done or what the result was.
Not Dubious (Score:3)
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From the summary:
The charity conducted its own tests on samples returned by 81 schools and has confirmed that 14 samples have lead above 50 micrograms per litre...
So even if the tests that the kids used were hobby-class, it was confirmed by better tests.
Australian Schools (Score:1)
Taste it (Score:1)
If the water you want to drink tastes sweet, don't drink it. That sweet taste is lead. This is also why paint that contains lead is sweet.