Cancer-Causing Pesticide ‘Garbage’ Taints Tap Water for Millions in California

California produces two-thirds of America’s fruits and nuts, and a third of its vegetables, with the lion’s share grown in the 250-mile-long San Joaquin Valley. But the bounty comes with a price: widespread contamination of drinking water from agricultural chemicals.

Among the most toxic is 1,2,3-trichloropropane, or TCP, an extremely potent carcinogen that was formerly an impurity in the pesticides Telone, made by Dow, and D-D, made by Shell. Telone and D-D were fumigants – poisonous gases injected into the soil before planting crops, to kill microscopic worms called nematodes. Shell stopped making D-D in 1984 and Dow later took TCP out of Telone — but not before it contaminated the tap water supplies of millions of Valley residents. TCP in drinking water is currently unregulated by both the state of California and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. California will soon set a legally permitted limit — a Maximum Contaminant Level, or MCL – requiring public utilities to test their water and, if needed, install filters to lower the level of the chemical. But according to lawsuits against Dow and Shell filed by dozens of […]

Full article: Cancer-Causing Pesticide ‘Garbage’ Taints Tap Water for Millions in California