At the peak of the flooding in July, more than 4 billion gallons of water flowed into Lake Champlain every hour carrying fuel oil, mercury, diesel, and phosphorus from upstream communities.
The British capital's Zoological Society said cleanup efforts have brought down levels of chemicals like phosphorus, making the river “home to myriad wildlife as diverse as London itself.”
Experts from the Penn State Center for Dirt and Gravel Road Studies call the road dumping of oil and gas wastewater an "environmentally unsound practice" that can cause water pollution and even damage roads.
Some 20,000 applications from oil and gas companies rolled in for $1 billion in taxpayer money to clean up privately owned wells sitting idle across Alberta.
