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WORRIESINNASSAU
newsday.com$3.99 |LI EDITIONSundayMay 25, 2014
THE LONG ISLAND NEWSPAPER
COPYRIGHT 2014, NEWSDAY LLC, LONG ISLAND, VOL. 74, NO. 264
NYCplans to reopenQueenswells, promptingconcern about impact on
LI groundwater
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BY JENNIFER [email protected]
New York City isseeking to reopendozens of itswells in
Queens,pumping millions
of gallons of drinking waterfrom the aquifers under LongIsland a
move that somepolicymakers and environ-mentalists say could
harmNassau Countys access to itsonly source of water.The city will
be de facto
taking Nassau water oncethey turn those wells on, saidSarah
Meyland, director ofthe Center forWater Resourc-es Management at
the NewYork Institute of Technologyin Old Westbury.The city plans
to reopen as
many as 52 of its 68 shutteredwells in Queens as part of
itsWater for the Future pro-gram, a $1.5 billion project bythe
citys Department of Envi-ronmental Protection to re-pair leaks in
the citys upstateaqueduct system.While part of the aqueduct
is closed for repairs, estimat-ed to begin in 2021 and take
aslong as 10 months, the cityplans to make up the loss in
water supply by pumpingmore than 33 million gallons aday from
the aquifer systemthat lies under geographicLong Island by
rehabilitatingthe currently dormant wells.The city has
maintained
state permits to operate thewells, some of which have notbeen
operated for nearly twodecades, and plans to conductpublic hearings
on the environ-mental impact of the pumpingthis fall, a source
said. Work toreopen the wells is expected tostart in 2016.The city
has yet to release
more data on the plans effect,but documents show that it
iseyeing the wells as a continued
source of water, even after theaqueduct project is completed.The
move has caused alarm
among some inNassauCounty,who fear the citys pumpingwill cause
increased saltwaterintrusion on the countys northand south shores,
a shift in thedirection of undergroundplumes of contamination, and
ageneral drawdown of the aqui-fer system, the sole source ofwater
for Nassaus nearly 1.4million residents.There is a natural
tenden-
cy for water to want to flowfrom Nassau into Queens,Meyland
said. As soon asthose wells come on, youregoing to increase the
natural
loss of water from Nassauinto the Queens part of theaquifer
system.Suffolk County, which also
relies on the aquifers as itssole source of water, wouldntlikely
see an effect, since theunderground topographykeeps water in
Suffolk fromflowing into Nassau, she said.State Sen. Jack Martins
(R-
Mineola)wrote to stateDepart-ment of EnvironmentalConser-vation
Commissioner Joe Mar-tens last month, urging him toensure the
citydoes a full analy-sis of the environmental im-pacts of its plan
includingthe effect onNassauCounty.Water doesnt know politi-
cal boundaries, Martins said.So we have these rules and
re-quirements to make sure oneside doesnt take risks at the
ex-pense of everyone else. And iftheres one thing were nevergoing
to risk, its going to be theintegrity of our groundwaterhere on
Long Island.Martins said he also asked
the DEC to consider suspend-ing the citys permits to oper-ate
the wells pending review.Its the equivalent of hav-
ing a blank check out therethat the Department of Envi-ronmental
Protection cancome and cash at any timewithout consequence,
withoutconcern about the potential en-vironmental impacts on
west-ern Nassau County, he said.The city did not make a rep-
resentative available for com-ment.Ron Busciolano,
superviso-
ry hydrologist in the Coramprogram office of the U.S.
Geo-logical Surveys New YorkWater Science Center, saidwhen the
Queens wells wereoperating, the water levelswere lowered by as much
as30 feet in some areas.A 1986 DEC report on Long
Islands groundwater foundthat pumping at the then-ac-
] NYCplans to reopenwells inQueensandpumpwater
fromunderNassau
] Critics fearmovewill harmLIgroundwater, increasesaltwater
intrusiononshorelines
TOPSTORIES
NEW
SDAY/ALEJANDRA
VILLA
Pumping water from NYC wells, such as this one in Laurelton,
Queens, could affect Nassau.
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SDAY,SU
NDAY,MAY25,2014
newsday.com
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tive Queens wells resulted inserious effects on the aquiferin
that area and in under-ground water flow across theborder from
Nassau.Those levels have rebounded
since the pumping stopped, butresumed pumping in Queenscould
cause underground con-taminants tomove and increasesaltwater
intrusion on theshores, Busciolano said.I think western Nassau
County, if they [the city] startpumping, would be the areayou
would see the effect, Bus-ciolano said.Some water authorities
in
Nassau County are alarmed.Saltwater intrusion is a
major, major concern of ourswith the activation of theQueens
wells, said Greg Gra-ziano, superintendent of theWater Authority of
GreatNeck North. Changing flowdirection is a concern. Theremay be
plumes out there thathave not impacted our wells.The Water
Authority of
Great Neck North penned aletter last month to the DECopposing
the reopening of thewells until a full environmen-tal review is
done, a positionechoed by Assemb. MichelleSchimel (D-Great Neck),
whoissued a statement May 1 ex-pressing her own concernsabout the
project.But Michael Tierney, super-
intendent of the Water Au-thority of Western Nassau,which the
city approached in2012 under a now-abandonedproposal to purchase
water
from two Nassau providers inaddition to reopening theQueens
wells, said he didntbelieve there would be an im-pact on Nassau.I
really do not see the dras-
tic issue on the water supply,Tierney said. They are nottrying
to impact us or any-body else in Nassau Countyor Suffolk
County.Andrew DeMartin, chair-
man of the board of the Man-hasset-Lakeville Water Dis-trict,
said he wanted to re-serve judgment until the citysplans were
firmed up.Until I see the science be-
hind what effect it will haveon the aquifers, I dont
neces-sarily think theres a reactionto it, DeMartin said. I
thinkthe people of Queens are al-lowed to the water under
their property, just as the peo-ple in Nassau are.Joe Martens,
commissioner
of the DEC, one of the agen-cies that would oversee the
re-opening of the wells, pledgedto monitor the situation.Were
concerned any time
theres an impact on ground-water, so were going to be in-volved,
Martens said. I thinkthe city will be more than
happy to cooperate with usand provide us all the informa-tion we
feel like we need inorder to evaluate the impactson
groundwater.Nassau County did not re-
spond to a request for com-ment on the citys plans. But
inFebruary 2012, Susan King,then-director of environmentalhealth
programs for theNassauCounty Department of Health,wrote a four-page
letter in re-sponse to the citys draft envi-ronmental impact
statement, inwhich she expressed concernsabout the plan. She urged
thecity to describe how it plannedto analyze the effect of
itspumping on the aquifers.It would be expected to
have a dramatic effect on thewater table elevation in
easternQueens and western Nassau,King wrote. The potentialdrawdown
of the water tablecould have a substantial
impacttoNassauCountywater suppli-ers and should be
thoroughlystudied and modeled prior toimplementation.The final
environmental im-
pact statement the city issuedin 2012 did not address the
fulleffects of reopening theQueenswells; a secondenviron-mental
impact statement or re-view on the well project is ex-pected to
come out this fall.The question is, whats that
impact going to look like?Mey-land said. That is a black
holeright now. The citys not talk-ing about it. And theres no onein
Nassau County capable ofmounting opposition to this.
TOPSTORIES
1,000 feet
200 feet
600 feet
1,000 feet
1,400 feet
B e d r o c k
Nassau
Queens
BrooklynJamaica
AtlanticOcean
EastRiver
EastRiver
EastRiver
Diagram isschematic
UpperGlacialAquifer
MagothyAquifer
JamecoAquifer
Saltygroundwater
LloydAquifer
Claysilt layer
Contractors work to build abypass tunnel to repair
NYCsRondout-West Branchaqueduct tunnel in Newburgh.
AP/JEFF
GOULDING
AQUIFERSUNDERLONGISLAND
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2014
