Dick Devens: Balancing need for new gas stations, clean drinking water

To The Daily Sun,

We need gas stations to thrive, but we need clean water to survive.

What is MEENA? Googling, I found:

“Montana Explorers, Entrepreneurs North America.” It has LLC, Limited Liability Contractor, after its name. Contractors need to make money. If they build a new gas station, will it damage our water? It’s inconvenient that we have fewer gas stations than we used to. I often get gas before I need to fill up, just because I see a station. It’s a nuisance, but I do it. I wish there were more gas stations around, but I’m not convinced that this one would be safe.

When I Googled “proposed new gas station in Effingham, NH,” I saw:

“State officials continue to recommend that municipalities prohibit gas stations as a “high-risk use” in sensitive drinking water areas, despite improvements in technology, as spills and accidents at gas pump islands are a routine source of contamination that can result in groundwater contamination, according to NH Department of Environmental Services.

Most immediately in harm’s way are the approximately 20 households that are within 1,000 feet of the site and rely on well water. In fact, when the original Boyle’s Market tanks were removed, the final DES report states that the soil sample from beneath the dispenser line contained the potential carcinogen naphthalene in a quantity four times higher than considered safe. Additional petroleum-related compounds found at the site included toluene, ethylbenzene, xylenes and several alkylbenzenes.”

That’s a lot of “-enes” making their way circuitously to the Atlantic Ocean, I think, as I look at my USGS map. When do we stop making variances?

Dick Devens

Center Sandwich