How the Flint River got so toxic

The Flint water crisis did not begin on April 25th, 2014, when the city switched its water supply from Detroit’s system, tapping Lake Huron to its own on the Flint River

That tragic mistake was the culmination of a much longer ongoing disaster, one caused by greed, politics, incompetence, and selective amnesia. The known consequences include lead poisoning, skin rashes, and carcinogens in the water. The total health consequences may not be known for years. Much has and will be written about that decision and its aftermath. Less has been written about how the Flint River became so polluted in the first place. Flint’s water crisis begins with the pollution of the Flint River, which has been going on for well over a century.

"It would be a mistake to conclude that Flint’s predicament is simply the result of government mismanagement,"  says Andrew Highsmith, author of Demolition Means Progress: Flint, Michigan, And The Fate Of The American Metropolis . "It’s also the product of a variety of much larger structural problems that are much more difficult to address." Besides economic factors, this includes a long history of environmental disasters and political dysfunction, much of it centered around the Flint River. None of these factors are unique to Flint; they’re at work in underfunded towns across the United States, the legacy of multiple industries from automobiles and chemicals to coal and agriculture.

This short history of pollution of the Flint River is gathered from multiple interviews and news sources, including over 400 historical documents from  The Flint Journal , the City of Flint, the Flint Public Library, Flint’s Sloan Museum, the Environmental Protection Agency, the US Department of the Interior, and various Michigan state agencies.

The more polluted a water source is, the more processing required to make the water safe to drink. Most of the contaminants now in Flint’s drinking water were introduced during or after processing. For all drinking water, the first concern is bacteria, which can cause diseases like hepatitis, Legionnaire’s disease, and other illnesses. Because Flint’s river water had high levels of bacteria, it was treated with additional chlorine. Chlorine reacts with organic material in the water to produce carcinogenic byproducts such as trihalomethanes; it also makes water more acidic, which corrodes pipes. Federal law mandates adding anti-corrosive agents to drinking water in large cities;  this standard water treatment practice was not followed. Finally, stagnation anywhere along the line raises the likelihood of bacteria and makes the water less safe to drink.

Immediately after switching to the Flint River, Flint’s drinking water spiked in bacteria and trihalomethane readings. A Flint-area outbreak of Legionnaire’s disease also coincided with the switch, causing at least 10 deaths. The acidic water corroded the old lead pipes; along with other heavy metals, lead seeped into the drinking supply where it caused widespread lead poisoning. Lead poisoning is the most widespread and serious health problem associated with Flint’s drinking water; children with prolonged exposure to lead experience a range of developmental problems that are incurable. Once pipes are corroded, even clean, properly treated water continues to carry lead and other contaminants through the tap. This is why aid organizations are still distributing bottled water and water filters, even though the city has stopped using water from the Flint River.

The way Flint mishandled water treatment is the primary cause of the water crisis. There is also the political question of officials’ responsibility for the crisis and their failure to respond after problems with the water became clear. But the original problem is that Flint’s river water is much more difficult to treat than water from Lake Huron, the city’s water source from 1974 to 2014. Flint’s water-treatment staff were not able to successfully make Flint River water safe to drink. Whether this is because they were undertrained, understaffed, or simply made a decision not to invest scarce resources into treating a temporary source of water — and who exactly made those decisions — is still unclear.

Why did Flint’s river pose so many problems? Before processing, the water itself is polluted from four sources: natural biological waste; treated industrial and human waste; untreated waste intentionally or accidentally dumped into the river; and contaminants washed into the river by rain or snow. The river is also warmer than Lake Huron, and its flow is less constant, particularly in the summer. All of this raises levels of bacteria and organic matter and introduces a wide range of other potential contaminants, whether natural or human-made.

In fact, while the Flint River had been improving thanks to the new regulations, the departure of heavy industry, and local cleanup efforts, it had long been known as an exceptionally polluted river. Until very recently, it had been repeatedly ruled out as a primary source for the city’s drinking water. It is hard to imagine why anyone familiar with the river’s history would ever decide to use it even as a temporary water source. But they did.

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Taxonomy

• Pollution
• Water Supply