Intreped
National Geographic reporter Brian Howard and a video crew went deep into the tunnels that are being built to save the Anacostia and Potomac from pollution.
You probably know the outlines of the story, but just in case: every time there's a large rainstorm in the city, water rushes into the city's aging sewer system and causes it to overflow not just rainwater and pollution, but sewage--directly into the Anacostia and Potomac rivers. DC Water is building a 13-mile tunnel that will hold rainwater until it can be safely and slowly dispersed into the Blue Plains treatment plant without causing any overflows. When finished, the system will divert and treat 96 percent of all stormwater, one of the highest goals in the country.
The Nat Geo report includes a cool video with computer-generated renderings of how "Lady Bird," the tunnel-boring machine, works. Read it
here.