From the Raleigh N&O [Clean wells left to chance]:
More than 2 million North Carolinians drink water from private wells. Most of them have no idea how dangerous that can be. Jerry and Mary Price do.
Three years ago, the Prices discovered that their Wake County well had been polluted with a colorless liquid used in the manufacture of gasoline, insecticides and other products.
They learned that they should limit their showers to five minutes, that they should not drink water from their taps or cook with it -- and that their government had known for seven years about polluted wells nearby but hadn't warned them or their neighbors.
Yikes! But should the government require well testing?
"I hope and pray that no one has developed cancer from this,'' said state Rep. Bernard Allen, a Beechwood Park neighbor whose well also was contaminated. "Some people have lived in the neighborhood for many, many years, and that's all the water that they've used. God forbid if that water was contaminated 25, 30 years ago."
After the pollution seeped into his neighborhood off Poole Road near the Neuse River, Allen tried to strengthen laws protecting private well owners. He wanted the state to require tests of private wells prior to sale or rental of property. And he wanted to require regulators to notify nearby property owners when they discovered contamination.
I have no problem with the last sentence, if water contamination is discovered I think the black helicopters should be launched and leaflets dropped in a 10 mile radius.
But why require water tests for EVERY real estate transaction? The last time we bought a house, i.e., the first time we bought a house with a private well, we paid about $200 for a water test before the sale closed. Every buyer has this option.
The argument could be made that the market failure is lack of perfect information. Some people may not know that well water should be tested. In that case, some sort of information requirement could be made to advise potential buyers that well water should be tested. Banks, appraisers and real estate agents are potential drinking water quality test alerters. Then, of course, potential buyers and homeowners could choose for themselves whether they want to bother with a water test.
But. The expenditure required for an information program can be justified on efficiency grounds only if perfect information is too costly for private individuals to obtain (i.e., it has some public good characteristics). In this case that isn't so. Our test cost $200, on the steep side because someone in my household is a fanatic, but some water tests are as low as $25, I think.
More from Raleigh:
He [state Rep. Bernard Allen] failed. The bill he introduced last year, opposed by real estate interests because of the cost, didn't get a hearing. Well owners still aren't told of nearby well contamination, and North Carolinians continue to drink water from private wells that are seldom, if ever, tested.
The state requires vehicle owners to get their cars and trucks inspected annually to make sure the horn honks and other equipment does what it's supposed to. It regulates sewage disposal. But at least three attempts during the past 15 years to require even minimal testing of private wells have been defeated.
What's the diff? Poor upkeep of cars creates a negative externality. People other than those who fail to take care of their cars might suffer. If you don't test your own water, only you and your family suffer.
Lest you think that I think the issue is not important, I dun't. I think it is very import. So my take home advise is: get your water tested!
