Clean, healthy drinking water is something that we take for granted in our country, but it is a precious commodity. We need to take every step we can to protect the health of our drinking water. It is a huge factor that affects all of us and should be a number one environmental issue that is addressed in the next 4 years. Bottled water and fracking are two main threats to this resource, I understand that we need a new and abundant energy source for the future, but we should seriously plan this out our methods and not simply produce a knee jerk reaction that will risk our drinking water supply. We need to focus on developing solar power to take the load off our fossil fuel dependency. Solar power has a lot of potential if we actually put monies into developing a viable method for obtaining energy. This would increase our production of clean energy at homes and factories and lessen our need for fossil fuels. We also need to look into alternative methods of extracting natural gas from the ground without contaminating our drinking water and endangering the well being of the populous. Natural gas is a great idea, if we do not harm our drinking water when we extract it from the ground. Rural and suburban homes could be turned into power plants if they were equipped with efficient solar power panels, small residential wind turbines (not the huge monstrosities that we are putting up everywhere) and methane digesters attached to septic systems. Factories and sky scrapers could use this technology on their roofs and sides of buildings.
Furthermore, we need to address the way that we package our foods. America’s meat products are tainted with antibiotics (80% of all antibiotics used in the USA are put into our food) and we are also packaging our food in products that taint our food stuffs with BET (BETE) and BPA. Our country is better than this…we can do better! An issue does not have to be on the nightly news to make it important to deserve our attention. You of all people are aware that there is a myriad of issues that the press does not latch on to that requires our immediate attention. If it is a good and just cause, the battle must be waged.
We need to pass a bottle bill in each state that will help reduce the amount of plastics we dump into the environment and we need to set laws in place that will protect our fresh water supply before we lose it. Water should be treated like the precious natural resource that it is and not just a product that can be bottle and sell at the expense of many and the environment. Just like the tobacco industry of old, we are being sold a bill of goods that really benefits a few at the expense of many. It is time for the people of our country and their leaders to rise above this crazy attitude that we have no affect on the planet and we can do whatever we want as long as it benefits me.