Study confirms GMO herbicide glyphosate contaminates groundwater supplies

Wednesday, December 28, 2011 by: Jonathan Benson, staff writer
Tags: glyphosate, groundwater, contamination

(NaturalNews) Contrary to claims made by the chemical industry and the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) that it does not leach into groundwater, the deadly herbicide glyphosate, also known as Roundup, has been found to be fully capable of contaminating groundwater supplies. Published in the journal Analytical and Bioanalytical Chemistry, a new study confirms that glyphosate is far from the benign crop protector that its proponents claim it is, and that it has the potential to cause widespread environmental damage.

For their study, researchers from the Institute of Environmental Assessment and Water Research (IEAWR) in Barcelona, Spain, performed a number of tests on groundwater samples to determine the presence of glyphosate. After employing a magnetic particle immunoassay (IA), as well as solid-phase extraction, liquid chromatography (LC), and tandem mass spectrometry (MS/MS), they determined that, while soils absorb some of the chemical, glyphosate does not fully break down before reaching groundwater, which the government and the chemical industry have long claimed it does.

In fact, the findings completely contradict claims made by the chemical industry and the EPA that glyphosate has "little potential for leaching to ground water." According to the EPA, "[m]icrobes in the soil readily and completely degrade [glyphosate] even under low temperature condition and glyphosate does not tend to accumulate in aquatic life" (http://www.epa.gov/ogwdw/pdfs/factsheets/soc...).

The EPA presumably obtained this false information directly from glyphosate's manufacturer, which just so happens to be the infamous Monsanto. But the agency has its own responsibility to verify safety claims on behalf of the public, which it obviously did not do for glyphosate. As a result, millions of gallons of this deadly chemical are doused on crops all around the world every year, and nobody knows how much of it has reached groundwater supplies.

Two other studies recently conducted by the US Geological Survey (USGS) also found glyphosate in streams and rivers, as well as in rainwater and even air surrounding agricultural areas that use glyphosate. And the worst aspect of this revelation is the fact that Monsanto has likely known about this environmental contamination for years, but has done nothing about it (https://www.naturalnews.com/033699_Roundup_po...).

Even though the lie that glyphosate does not contaminate groundwater supplies has been officially debunked, it is highly unlikely that either the EPA or the chemical industry will reverse its errant position on the matter.

Sources for this article include:

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22101424