11/22/2024
Earlier this week, while attending the Minnesota Groundwater Association’s annual conference, I was struck by the many ways in which groundwater can impact our lives.
From drinking water, to irrigation, to calcareous fens, to Coca Cola, water flashed through my mind. I saw it being sucked like a straw through large pipes and tubes, sloshing its way onto fields, seeping up through wetlands, and pouring from a tap in a manufacturing plant while being mixed with a vanilla flavored syrup into a bottle stamped with its iconic logo.
My mind was moving so quickly, I could barely keep up. Mentions of complicated legal structures, military land, and immense quantities of PFAS (a cluster of carcinogenic chemicals) poisoning our waters and all that they support. And so much talk about remediation. How do we remove this poison? How do we minimize suffering?
As I let the information ruminate in my mind, tossing and turning, I pondered how we would weigh it all. Human health, incomes, stock markets, animals, trees, tiny little bugs, fungus, and copious amounts of energy. Who wins? What wins? At the end of the day, can we really have this all?
Water is precious. Like blood, we cannot live without it. As it is poisoned, we try to mask the impact with innovative technology and alternative sources of water. But the trees still stand, the wildlife still roam, and the tadpoles still travel. One lifeway to another, this poison permeates the ecosystem we depend on. So, how do we accept the fate we have created for ourselves? Because the poison is simply going next door if it is not staying here. And with the growing demands of human desire mixed with a changing climate, the supply of fresh water is only getting smaller.
As I came away from the conference, I was filled with immense gratitude for all the brilliant minds across Minnesota and the outer-lying states grappling with these challenges. Considering how we protect and sustain clean, fresh water for generations to come. Identifying tools and strategies that will help us thrive together, despite our misdoings.
Thank you to the Minnesota Groundwater Association for hosting a fabulous conference!
