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Teresa Norberg-King Chat Session
Moderator: Testing...
Teresa Norberg-King: I'm here!
Moderator: Hello, and welcome to another Bell LIVE! host researcher
chat session! I would especially like to welcome
Teresa Norberg-King from the Minnesota Environmental Protection Agency.
Teresa, maybe we should start off having you tell
us a little bit about the EPA.
Teresa Norberg-King: The United States Environmental Protection
Agency is a federal agency, that whose goal is to protect
human health and safeguard the natural environment.
Teresa Norberg-King: The United States Environmental Protection
Agency is a federal agency, that whose goal is to protect
human health and safeguard the natural environment. We are a "research"
laboratory for the Agency and while we are located
in Minnesota, we do work on all issues in the nation, not very many only
in Minnesota.
Moderator: We have a good question from Amy here in Minnesota.
"How can you tell if water has pollution in it?"
Teresa Norberg-King: Pollution is something that you cannot always
see, but in other instances it will be colored water, dead
animals. Pollution is too much of something that causes the water and
the organisms in the water to die. Some waters from
wastewater treatment plants will be colored and some will look like drinking
water, however, you cannot be sure that either is
"safe". We can measure for chemicals and check the levels if they are
safe to be discharged, however, sometimes the waters
are discharged and the levels were not safe. Then we can have a problem
of pollution.
Moderator: Christain, aslo from Minnesota wants to know, "What
do you do when you find pollution in some water? Who
has to clean it up?"
Teresa Norberg-King: When you find pollution in water, you may
not "see" anything. Scientists have developed techniques to
test the water, and put samples into machines (instruments) and measure
the concentration of many chemicals. However, there
are estimates that over 5,000 new chemicals are developed each year, so
we are certainly not going to be able to have good
techniques for all those chemicals quickly. We use a variety of techniques
to manage those chemicals. We can measure certain
ones that may have a greater effect, we can use biological organisms in
toxicity tests to be our detector, and EPAs job is to
regulate what is discharged into the environment. For instance, any industry
or wastewater treatment plant who uses water in
their process, must report to EPA what they plan to use for chemicals,
how they will treat them and how they will be sure to
discharge safe levels. When and if they ever pollute, they can be responsible
for having to clean it up and pay the government
back for any assistance they get from state and federal organizations.
In addition, they may have to pay fines that are set by the
legal system and based on the level of damage they caused.
Moderator: Tim from Minnesota was wondering, "What kind of research
do you do?"
Teresa Norberg-King: In our laboratory, the specific area I work
on to to assess the interactive effects of organic chemicals,
metals, and water quality characteristics on aquatic life. Specifically,
over my years as a research scientist, I have development
toxicity testing methods for fish and invertebrates for both wastewater
and sediments. We use freshwater fish and invertebrates,
and the methods we have used have been adopted throughout the United States
as one of the requirements for almost all
industries and wastewater treatment plants to use for monitoring whether
their wastewater (effluent) is toxic. We'll show the
bugs, fish, and samples types that we use in the live program next week.
Moderator: Edward from Wisconsin wants to know, "What does zoology
mean?"
Teresa Norberg-King: (following computer crash and need to reboot)
Zoology means is the branch of science that deals with
animals and a zoologist (is not someone who works in a zoo) but rather
someone who studies the properties and vital
characteristics of animals.
Moderator: Now Amy wants to know, "What is the worst kind of pollution?"
Teresa Norberg-King: We hope that we have seen the worst kinds
of pollution. Some examples of these were mercury
pollution which caused thousands of people to die in Japan (about 50 years
ago). Chemicals such as dioxin, polychlorinated
biphenyls (PCBs), lead paint, and such chemicals that were thought to
be such good chemicals when they were developed
have had lasting effects. Some of these are chemicals are still in the
environment because they are very persistent, but they
cannot be used or produced for use anymore.
Moderator: Tim was wondering, "What was your favorite subject in
school?"
Teresa Norberg-King: My favorite subject(s) in school (junior and
high) were Biology, English literaure, and physical
education (we played softball, volleyball, basketball, etc and I love
to do those things).
Moderator: Christain has two questions, "Does lake Superior have
pollution in it and is it safe to swim in it?"
Teresa Norberg-King: I'll answer those in reverse order... The
lake is safe to swim in, however, very few people will swim in
it because it is much cooler (cold) than any water you would swim in.
The average temperature is 45 F so, only near shore
during the months of July and August and possibly some of September is
it comfortable to swim in. You would probably only
wade! Does it have pollution in it? Lake Superior is an incredibly clean
and clear lake. It is very cold, and very deep and has a
lot of water. There are not very many industrial dischargers on this lake
either, I would describe it as a safe lake. The city of
Duluth uses it as their source for drinking water, and we use it as our
source of test water for our animals in the laboratory. We
draw the water from the lake in front of our laboratory, and pull it through
a pump house, and we even have our own water
tower to manage the amounts of water we need to keep our cultures of fish
and invertebrates alive and water we need for
testing. We maintain large tanks of trout (which need running water to
keep the oxygen levels high) for some of our research
here.
Moderator: Edward wants to know, "What is your favorite fish?"
Teresa Norberg-King: My favorite fish are the bass, both smallmouth
and largemouth. I have raised them in the laboratory
(hard thing to do) and have found them challenging. They will eat the
smaller bass and then challenge the bigger one. We use
the "fathead minnow" the most for testing, and it is a fish that is commonly
used as a bait fish. I generally know the freshwate
fish the best, and the saltwater fish are much more colorful and different
than the trout or salmon, northern pike, walleye, bass,
sunfish, crappies, and such that we have here.
Moderator: Amy was curious, "What does pollution do to fish and
other animals that live in the water?"
Teresa Norberg-King: Good question! Pollution can do several things--it
can kill fish and bugs, cause birds bills to be
deformed, reduce egg production and animal reproduction, and eliminate
species all together. We study the "gross" effects on
animals, such as deformed beaks, and then study the sublethal effects
on reproduction and try to determine the long-term
effects on the population by species, and by the "food chain" groups.
We also know that certain chemicals accumulate in fish, in
their fat, and that humans should not eat fish from the Great Lakes daily.
There are guidance documents that show how often to
eat the fish, such as trout, smelt and such. When humans eat fish that
have such chemicals in them, we can measure it in the milk
that mothers produce for their babies, and some of these chemicals are
thought to be responsible for cancers and deformities
or learning disabilities in babies.
Moderator: Okay, last question. Tim was wondering, "Are all of
the other great lakes clean like lake Superior?"
Teresa Norberg-King: No, Lake Superior is "superior" in that regard
in my opinion. Many of the other Great Lakes have had
severe problems and we have had to work hard on restoring them. Lake Erie
was thought to be "dead" in the late 1960's due to
pollutants. We were using a certain chemical in our soap that caused the
problem. We restricted the use of that, and the lake
has recovered, enough that some of the largest fish contests are again
being held on the lake. The most important thing is that
we must keep these lakes this way, and be sure that we teach everyone
to think about what they use, and throw away.
Moderator: Great chat session everybody! I would like to thank
everone who participated this afternoon. I would especially
like to thank Teresa Norberg-King for taking time out this weekend to
answer all of our questions! Make sure you look for her
in the October 12th broadcast. See you then!
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