400,000 Black Balls Save L.A. Reservoir From Carcinogen
Wed, Jun 11, 2008
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*Update – all images from the awesome Dakota Smith at Curbed. More photos There*
image (c) Dakota Smith
The Department of Water and Power workers in Los Angeles, as well as local officials and community activists opened a white tub from where they poured 400,000 black colored balls into the water. So, the question is: was this an artwork, some kind of statement or attempt to pollute the water?
image (c) Dakota Smith
The answer on all fronts is no – absolutely and categorically no. In fact, it is an action intended to protect the quality of L.A. drinking water and preventing it from becoming a health hazard. The water needs to be protected and in the shade because of its composition of bromate and chlorine – if exposed to large amounts of sunlight, it could cause a chemical reaction and in high levels can cause cancer.
Last year, abnormally high levels of bromide were signaled, but specialists claimed that danger levels were low because people had to drink the water for a lifetime – even so, the chances of contracting cancer were minimal.
image (c) Dakota Smith
After the discovery of bromate, officials began to search for a method to shade the Ivanhoe and Elysian Reservoirs, but all suggested options would need time and a helluva lot of money. Instead, local government followed the advice of a DWP biologist who came with the idea to use these black plastic balls you see in the pictures.
The reservoirs will be covered by 3 million balls for roughly 4 years.
Sources: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 Images: 1, 2, 3
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1 Trackbacks For This Post
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Stuff to Look At - 6/12/08 | s00per.com ( · )( · ) hand check! Says:
June 12th, 2008 at 1:14 pm[...] Whole lotta black balls (Story/Pics) Beer Pong Slam Dunk…by some old guy (Video) [...]
June 11th, 2008 at 8:43 pm
Anybody else picture 200,000 black dudes teabagging the reservoire?
June 11th, 2008 at 9:03 pm
And why do they think that no chemicals will leach out of these *plastic* balls?
June 11th, 2008 at 9:08 pm
That’s exactly what I pictured.
June 11th, 2008 at 9:09 pm
Nice. Glad your mom lets you use the computer once a week to check e-mail, and ends up with this as a result. Go back to the basement.
June 11th, 2008 at 9:10 pm
when asked if this would work they replied: outlook uncertain ask again later.
June 11th, 2008 at 9:13 pm
That is by far the best artistic representation I have ever seen of the floating island of plastic waste the size of Texas that is currently growing in the Pacific Ocean. More plastic please! We are all doomed.
June 11th, 2008 at 9:15 pm
Turns out commies aren’t the only things getting blackballed in LA
June 11th, 2008 at 9:31 pm
Okay, but is that the kind of plastic that leaches toxins into water? What is it’s recycle number? It figures, just when I stop using plastic water bottles, you guys put plastic in at the source….thanks
June 11th, 2008 at 9:35 pm
Gee, would it not make more since to use white balls instead of black ones. Black will absorb the sun’s heat, thus possibly making the water hotter?
June 11th, 2008 at 9:39 pm
Oh yeah and just a thought…Doesn’t black attract heat? making the water hotter?
June 11th, 2008 at 9:39 pm
No.
June 11th, 2008 at 9:42 pm
MOD PARENT UP!
June 11th, 2008 at 9:44 pm
Well, I am now.
June 11th, 2008 at 9:46 pm
No, I think you were the only one. And I think you have some homoerotic issues to work through
June 11th, 2008 at 9:48 pm
Relax, everything will be fine until the black balls are discovered to have been manufactured in China using carcinogenic materials or lead paint.
Not that anyone would notice any difference from the people in California.
June 11th, 2008 at 9:59 pm
4 YEARS??
I have a feeling this is a bad idea.
Is there any aquatic life there?
June 11th, 2008 at 10:02 pm
Can’t wait to see what happens when 400,000 plastic balls start changing their chemical make up after exposure to hot sunlight. They might be making the situation worse as the oils from the plastic get into the water.
June 11th, 2008 at 10:07 pm
Wont the chemicals from the plastic when exposed to the sunlight leech into the water…..?
June 11th, 2008 at 10:22 pm
This is innovative and a good step. Uh, if the intent is to keep the water cooler would it not be better to have the balls in a light color that reflects heat rather than black which absorbs it and transfers it to the water? Derned six grade science class just won’t go away.–
June 11th, 2008 at 10:38 pm
So the bisphenol a or phthalates or other potential carcinogens leaching out of the plastic balls are somehow better for us? What a ridiculous boondoggle.
June 11th, 2008 at 10:52 pm
How rather odd I stumble here considering my bromate reference a mere 4 hours ago. I wonder if blue balls are good for anything?
June 11th, 2008 at 10:58 pm
Wait till the “discover” all the carcinogens that leach into the water from the black balls! duh! muwahahaha…
June 11th, 2008 at 11:07 pm
So thats where my magic 8 ball disappeared to.
June 11th, 2008 at 11:17 pm
Great, now people will have pthalate or PCB leaching to contend with.
June 11th, 2008 at 11:26 pm
In related news, scientists discover that the plastic black balls made in China are more likely to cause serious health problems than bromide.
June 11th, 2008 at 11:27 pm
Probably like 203,000. It’s a dangerous world, man.
June 11th, 2008 at 11:31 pm
No. No teabag.
But WHO added the chlorine? It is an unstable chemical in water and will evaporate in a few days. As to the bromide, it too, had to be added.
Usually, those chemicals signify unsafe hazzards in the water. Someone is trying to “cover up” a problem…
Criptosporoza, or worse.
CHEERS EVERYONE!
June 11th, 2008 at 11:37 pm
I wonder if they will heat up the water and cause it to evaporate quicker? Remember, black absorbs sunlight and heats up pretty good. Also, in the movie, “The Abyss”, they did kinda the same thing, only they used smaller balls the size of bb’s or so. That way, they would have no light underwater where they were filming, and, if there were an emergency, they could get out of the water quicker than if they used a tarp over the water. Oh! They were filming in an uncompleated and abandoned nuclear power plant…
June 11th, 2008 at 11:52 pm
FILTHY!!
June 12th, 2008 at 12:39 am
No, that’s stupid.
June 12th, 2008 at 1:12 am
That…unfortunatly…is.exactly what I thought of after reading that headline. Do they do it intentionaly or is it that they are too lazy to proofread what they have written? Either way its hilarious
June 12th, 2008 at 1:15 am
nope
June 12th, 2008 at 1:15 am
weird as hell yes but a pretty ingenious idea if you ask me….which you didn’t
June 12th, 2008 at 1:54 am
Only in California. Bromate? Chlorine? These are not found in rain water, or runoff. How the heck did the chemicals get into the water, anyway? I’ll bet some enviromental wacko group forced the addition of free chlorine to the water in order to find a solution for a problem they created themselves.
What kind of cancer problems do you get from plastic balls that break down under UV exposure? Can you spell S-T-O-O-P-I-D?
June 12th, 2008 at 2:03 am
No, because testicles look more like (nut-) sacks than balls.
June 12th, 2008 at 2:36 am
Anything going to leach out of the plastic balls and contaminate the water? After 4 years? In the sun?
June 12th, 2008 at 2:40 am
Huh, I wonder what the balls are made from… and what the plastic contains. Probably more carcinogens ?
June 12th, 2008 at 2:42 am
Leaching and contamination, eh? Poly this and that from plastics? Coming soon, maybe in four years, The Creature from the Black Lagoon.
June 12th, 2008 at 3:21 am
It occurs to me that the leaching of 400,000 plastic balls from sun bleaching might have an injurious effect on the quality of the water…especially after 4 years. Then again maybe it’s just me.
June 12th, 2008 at 3:47 am
a+
June 12th, 2008 at 4:09 am
mmm… tea…
June 12th, 2008 at 5:01 am
I love you
June 12th, 2008 at 7:13 am
That’s nice. Why did they use black though, won’t they get hot and melt abit and release plastic into the water?
women in LA have too many rights.
women’s rights should be removed.
June 12th, 2008 at 9:29 am
Great! Instead of the carcinogen bromide, instead they get to choke on carcinogens from the plastic balls! Isn’t progress wonderful?
June 12th, 2008 at 1:25 pm
Reminds me of the world of The Matrix where they released black nano-particles into the atmosphere to block off sunlight for the Machines…
June 12th, 2008 at 2:29 pm
Same faulted logic behind automobile-tire reefs in Florida.
June 12th, 2008 at 2:32 pm
It’s probably UV light that causes the reaction and not heat. So really the color of the balls shouldn’t matter as long as it is efficient at blocking UV light. Maybe black does that best.
June 12th, 2008 at 3:09 pm
Uh…. Might as well cover the entire surface with crude… But that would cost 160$ a barrell by the time they’re done… And people would steal the water then… I wonder if there’s any crude in those black balls? They hit the Lotto on that solution!
June 12th, 2008 at 3:54 pm
Some interesting questions:
1. yes, the plastic will probably leach into the water and is bad for the environment, but so are all the radio/satellite/tv waves, smoking, and bunches of other stuff.
2. NO I did not think of a sexual picture when I read the headlines.
3. Yes, they add chlorine to all drinking water provided by the cities, they also add flouride. Neither is good for you, but is condisered a “neccisity” because of bacteria, etc.
Hope this helps.
Oh, and they used black to cause the water to be shaded, white would have let some sunlight through, colours could have caused something else funky with the water.
June 12th, 2008 at 4:22 pm
Three million black plastic balls, 10 cm diameter each, loaded with antioxidants, UV absorbers, and ozone-protectants so they don’t go to mulch in full California sunlight. Black heats in sunlight speeding things along. Sphere total area is (3×10^6)4(pi)(5 cm)^2 or 10^9 cm^2 in round numbers. 100,000 m^2 of hot plastic will be leaching additives into reservoir drinking water. Given California wildfires… do they contain cryptoestrogenic and carcinogenic fire retardants, too?
June 12th, 2008 at 4:32 pm
Ya but over 4 years, a 1/4 trillion gallons of water will have passed by. The concentrations will be much lower then, say a pint of water stored in a bottle. 200,000 Water bottles would only be 25,000 gallons.
Bromine needs shielding from UV light
June 13th, 2008 at 6:31 am
Do you by any chance attend my local high school?
June 13th, 2008 at 4:22 pm
well, it certainly is creative… I dont think I could have come up with something like that sober.
I wonder if this is going to become a tourist attraction…
May 13th, 2009 at 4:02 pm
Are these just plain plastic balls, or are they like bio balls for a fish tank containing charcoal as a filter?
June 19th, 2009 at 11:32 pm
Plastic leaching concern is understandable, I thought the same thing.
However a Google search clears up the issue, almost as fast as making an ignorant, presumptive comment does.
from http://articles.latimes.com/2008/jun/10/local/me-balls10?pg=1
“one of the DWP’s biologists, Brian White, suggested “bird balls,” commonly used by airports to prevent birds from congregating in wet areas alongside runways.
DWP officials and Orange Products, the Allentown, Pa.-based company that produces the balls, said this is the first time a major utility has used the globes to solve a water- quality problem for a drinking supply.
White said that Orange Products is the only company in the United States that could manufacture the balls, which are environmentally safe for drinking water and approved by NSF International, a government-sanctioned, nonprofit water quality organization.
The balls, which cost 40 cents each, are made of polyethylene. The coating contains carbon. Black is the only color strong enough to deflect ultraviolet rays, said Paul Sachdev, president of Orange Products.”
from http://www.csslr.org/newsevents/events.php
Perhaps the greatest misinformation I have recently seen is the notion that the bird balls heat up and release toxic chemicals into the water. This is just simply not true. Granted, there are many different types of plastics and recent news has focused on certain plastics leaching chemicals. The reason DWP is using the bird balls is because they are the ONLY National Sanitation Foundation (NSF) drinking-water-approved product of its kind on the market. When we discuss NSF approval, it means that this product has been tested precisely to ensure that it does not create the kinds of problems that some are insisting they create. The balls are made of High Density Polyethylene – a long-time water industry product also used for pipelines, and a black version of the same clear product you buy your one gallon container of milk in (look on the bottom for the HDPE label). You will not find any legitimate news findings claiming that HDPE leaches chemicals into drinking water. As a matter of fact, other water agencies have contacted DWP out of recognition that this solution could have application for them as well.
The balls are made to survive in a hot, sunlight environment without breaking down, and they are warranted for 10 years – twice the lifetime we are looking for. As to the issue of heating the water, there are two important points. First, there is only a very, very small percentage of reservoir water actually in contact with the surface of the balls. Secondly, the balls are filled with air, which also acts as an insulating layer, much the way double pane windows and attics help keep the heat out of our homes.
June 20th, 2009 at 1:58 am
What do they want to shade the lakes for? Didn’t they think that the balls are black? They even heat more up so prabably even more water evaporates.
Are they trying to save the world, or destraying it even more?
What a bullshit solution! Instead of reducing water usage in “lawn culture” and using permaculture principles to solve the worlds problems!
Karsten
July 24th, 2009 at 10:00 am
is there a video of this??
August 28th, 2009 at 4:43 am
Its LA the balls will be stolen within 2 months!
August 31st, 2009 at 6:37 pm
Enjoy drinking your phylates, LA.
There’s no problem the government can’t make worse.
September 4th, 2009 at 5:17 am
Gee, the reservoir has been there – exposed to the sun and smog – for at least 40+ years that i can remember.
THIS is what they’ve come up with?
Here’s a radical idea: why not attempt to remove the bromate from the water?
Whatever happened to using ‘activated’ charcoal?
December 9th, 2009 at 4:47 pm
Yeah?
And what evidence do they have that these plastic balls will cure their cancer water?
And for that matter, how on earth does someone deduce that the water will give you cancer?
Seems like we’re all just looking for ways to kill ourselves these days.
Let’s launch a couple hundred-thousand pounds of garbage at the moon! It’ll cure Arthritis!
January 4th, 2010 at 2:52 am
I hope the balls were not made in China.
January 5th, 2010 at 6:24 pm
I always cover my balls when I’m in the sun.