LONG ISLAND GROUNDWATER

This special feature section of the website provides information about water and groundwater issues on Long Island.

CCE works to Protect the Long Island Aquifer System

VICTORY! On September 26, 2008, the Long Island Lloyd Aquifer Protection Bill was signed into law. This important legislation ensures continued protection of Lloyd Aquifer. The legislation also ensures that NYC will not be able to pump or store water from the Lloyd Aquifer for their drinking water needs.

Thank you to all our members who made phone calls and wrote letters to the Governor asking him to sign the legislation.

Long Island has been designated as a sole-source aquifer region by the U.S. EPA. This means that 100% of our drinking water supply comes from underground. The almost 3 million residents on our island are completely dependent on groundwater as our fresh water supply.

The Lloyd aquifer is the deepest and cleanest source of drinking water on Long Island.
Yet, NYC was aggressively seeking to use Long Island’s aquifer as a storage facility for their own drinking water.

Their plan was to initiate a pilot program beginning with the injection of 300-400 gallons of water per day into the Lloyd Aquifer. This would then lead to a large scale project of injecting 50 million gallons per day into the Lloyd aquifer in Queens. After 5 years, the artificially recharged Lloyd Aquifer would be tapped to supply up to 200 million gallons a day for two years back to NYC.

This critical legislation takes necessary steps to safeguard the Lloyd Aquifer, an irreplaceable drinking water resource, and stop any proposals that would permit the misuse of this resource. Thanks again to all our members who have taken time to voice your concerns. Our voices were heard and our oldest and deepest source of drinking water is forever protected from risky proposals.

Updated by tbono 9/27/11