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AGENCIES STUDY SALT THREAT TO LBI'S DRINKING WATER Date: 040608 From: http://www.pressofatlanticcity.com/ ANY PROBLEM LIKELY TO BE DECADES AWAY, OFFICIAL SAYS By Eric Tucker, Staff Writer, (609) 978-2012 Press of Atlantic City, June 8, 2004 Barnegat Light - State and federal agencies studying water use in southern Ocean County are investigating whether salt water may leak into one of Long Beach Island's drinking-water sources. There is no problem now, and it could be several decades before there is noticeable salt-water intrusion into the drinking-water supply, according to officials with the state Department of Environmental Protection and the United States Geological Survey, or USGS, which are conducting the study. The USGS, part of the federal Department of the Interior, has been working in cooperation with the NJDEP to assess water use data from Ocean County municipalities. The project began several years ago and is likely to be concluded in 2005. Experts are measuring water levels, taking chloride analyses and working on a groundwater flow model. This will allow them to predict the effect of water removal by wells on the Atlantic City 800-foot sand aquifer, said Anthony Navoy, assistant district chief for the USGS in New Jersey. The two largest aquifers used by the public on Long Beach Island are the Piney Point aquifer and the Atlantic City 800-foot sand aquifer, a primary water supply of beach communities from Barnegat Light to Stone Harbor, Navoy said. An edge of the Atlantic City 800-foot-sand aquifer "pinches out" north of Barnegat Light, where it is exposed and comes in contact with Barnegat Bay and the salt waters of the Atlantic Ocean, Navoy said. He said the agencies would need to study what would happen over time if water removal on the northern end of the island were to increase, causing water levels in the aquifer to decrease, potentially allowing salt water to seep into the aquifer. "If water levels continue to decline, this is why we're studying it: Will that result in saltwater coming in?" Navoy asked. The problem of saltwater intrusion is a familiar one in southern New Jersey. In Cape May, for instance, the situation became so dire that city officials in 1998 opened a $5 million desalination plant to remove the salt from saltwater. It was the first town in the Northeast to open such a plant. But Navoy said the potential problems in Long Beach Island were not comparable to that situation and cautioned that there was no immediate threat. "It's nothing like Cape May in terms of urgency," Navoy said. He added that any evidence of saltwater intrusion would likely be detected only gradually. "We're trying to determine if there will be a problem in the future," Navoy said. "And again, this is on the order of decades." A "necessary consequence" of pumping water for public use is that water levels in aquifers are subsequently lowered and in some places have fallen well below the sea level, Navoy said. Water levels come progressively closer to sea level further north along the coast.