5667 replies to this topic

[VicHockeyFan]

Is this the first we've (or "they've") heard of this issue, or has it been a known issue all along, just not reported on or detailed?

 

Seems crazy that this new plant will still dump raw sewage into the ocean, despite the many millions of $$$$ being spent ... and that the public is just hearing about it now.

 

You can only scale it so high.  I think this would be typical of most plants.  Nowhere to store it if you can not treat it fast enough.  

[spanky123]

Is this the first we've (or "they've") heard of this issue, or has it been a known issue all along, just not reported on or detailed?

 

Seems crazy that this new plant will still dump raw sewage into the ocean, despite the many millions of $$$$ being spent ... and that the public is just hearing about it now.

 

You have to think that they knew all along but were just waiting until we were half way through the project to tell people and then ask for more money.

[Mike K.]

Didn’t we know this for quite a while? I think that was one of the anti-sewage treatment arguments but the whole process was so convoluted, so complicated and took so many years to flesh out that it’s hard for an average taxpayer to remember it all.

[nerka]

I don't think this is new - most sewage plants have a maximum capacity, and many/most have to discharge untreated/minimally treated sewage when capacity is overloaded.

[nerka]

From Wikipedia:

Capture and use of landfill gas can be expensive.

Capture is mandated by the provincial regulations, so that cost is incurred no matter what. So the economic question becomes: "Is it better to just flare the gas or to invest in generation equipment and burn it for electricity?"

[VicHockeyFan]

Capture is mandated by the provincial regulations, so that cost is incurred no matter what. So the economic question becomes: "Is it better to just flare the gas or to invest in generation equipment and burn it for electricity?"

 

Right, that makes sense.  I see that only about 10% of North American dumps convert to energy, so it's probably a poor investment.

[JohnN]

From early on in the sewage plant planning process, the necessity for having variable treatment levels depending on extreme flows seems to have been part of the discussion. Didn't seem illogical that when flows are high - usually prompted by rainfall events together with Inflow and Infiltration into the system, that the sewage plant processes could be overwhelmed by the process. Some older municipalities such as Victoria and Esquimalt have been spending a fair amount of money to reduce I&I and thus some of the impact of extreme flows (although they're probably more concerned about paying for unnecessary sewage treatment of rainwater).

 

However, with climate change forecasting more extreme weather events such as longer summer droughts, larger winter rainfalls, its possible that a slightly higher number of extreme flow events will occur.

 

In the diagram below, ADWF is Average Dry Weather Flow. Diagram dates from 2015 but I'm pretty sure similar diagrams were around in 2009-2010 when first McLoughlin project was approved by CRD.

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[JohnN]

TC editorial today concludes:

It will likely take until 2030 to fix the problems with the pipes so the plant doesn’t get overwhelmed. Opponents of the project will say pumping screened sewage into the water has always been fine, so don’t worry. But this is one more wrinkle in a project that already has more wrinkles than a prune.

- "Editorial: Sewage surprise": http://www.timescolo...rise-1.23298405

[Mike K.]

I’m no fan of the project, but we’ve also known for a very long time that Greater Victoria’s sewage infrastructure is in terrible condition and needs massive investment to repair and modernize.

[JohnN]

I’m no fan of the project, but we’ve also known for a very long time that Greater Victoria’s sewage infrastructure is in terrible condition and needs massive investment to repair and modernize.

Victoria and Esquimalt have been spending to upgrade sewage infrastructure and consequently reduce inflow and infiltration issues but if the timing and amount of upgrade is tied directly to the sewage project, it could be seen (at least in part) as part of the cost of the project.

 

Is reducing I&I with our current system as urgent as with a sewage treatment plant? I think part of the impetus for spending to reduce I&I has been to reduce treating rainwater and has been sold as a way of reducing a bit of the volume-based sewage charges on residents.

 

Image below is of graph showing age of sewage infrastructure in City of Victoria, prior to a large increase in funding for upgrading that began in 2010 as I recall.

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[JohnN]

Jack Hull was CRD's chief sewage plant project manager for several years.

His letter concludes:

Despite the reduction in the capital cost, the contribution by local taxpayers increased to $311 million from $288 million. The CRD is proposing to bring back resource recovery at Hartland but funded from environmental resource management reserves. Taxpayers deserve cost transparency without such budget reallocations to disguise the project’s true cost.

 

- "Sewage-project costs have to be transparent": 

http://www.timescolo...rent-1.23299457

[Hotel Mike]

I notice a lot of places for sale in Shoal Point. Maybe they're beginning to realize that they are down wind from the stinky new sewage treatment plant at McLaughlin Point.

[JohnN]

I notice a lot of places for sale in Shoal Point. Maybe they're beginning to realize that they are down wind from the stinky new sewage treatment plant at McLaughlin Point.

Shoal Point is located in the segment that has highest frequency of summer winds blowing from McLoughlin Point,  in terms of 2016 proportion of time of wind direction according to this wind diagram (below). Not sure who produced the diagram nor what source they used. 

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[VicHockeyFan]

Ah, and the entire downtown too.  Sweet.

[Cassidy]

Aren't these hi-tech sewage treatment plants supposed to essentially be "stink-free"?

[JohnN]

Aren't these hi-tech sewage treatment plants supposed to essentially be "stink-free"?

Indeed, sewage plants are usually designed to minimise odours but the actually operation and operational issues may mean short-term or periodic episodes of higher-than-designed odour levels beyond the sewage treatment plant site boundaries. As I recall, the Bazan Bay sewage plant near Sidney had hundreds of odour complaints over the first years of its operation, prompting additional expense to install carbon filters, which I think were effective. Here is diagram of design for dispersal of OU (odour units) levels from the McLoughlin sewage plant and while Shoal Point isn't specifically included, might be similar to the James Bay level. From CRD pamphlet: https://www.crd.bc.c...vrsn=9e283dca_8

 

Related TC news story: 

"More stringent odour limits proposed for sewage plant": http://www.timescolo...lant-1.14870276

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[nerka]

^ The CRD pamphlet says this:

Odour is not discernible at 5 OU or less

 

While the TC article says this:

An odour unit per cubic metre is defined as the point at which 50 per cent of testers cannot smell the odour using an olfactometer but 50 per cent can.

 

The TC has the correct definition - at 1 OU 50% should be able to detect. Doesn't mean they will find it stinky yet at that concentration but they will detect. In the real world there are other competing odours so a given smell may be harder to detect than in the lab.  On the other hand glitches in plant operation could increase odour emissions from time to time.

 

Bottom line is if the plant performs to the standard they modelled then folks in James Bay won't be smelling much ever.

[ks112]

If anyone believes much of the "facts" that brought about the sewage plant, I've got a $65 million, $92 million, $120 million bridge I can sell them.

 

Is this the first we've (or "they've") heard of this issue, or has it been a known issue all along, just not reported on or detailed?

 

Seems crazy that this new plant will still dump raw sewage into the ocean, despite the many millions of $$$$ being spent ... and that the public is just hearing about it now.

 

Sewage treated with primary treatment is different from raw sewage, please check your facts

[Cassidy]

Sewage treated with primary treatment is different from raw sewage, please check your facts

 

Crap dumped into the ocean is crap dumped into the ocean ... whether it's been slightly "tamed" or not prior to dumping is irrelevant to my post, which was about what the public did or didn't know ... please check your attitude.

[JohnN]

Sewage treated with primary treatment is different from raw sewage, please check your facts

 

The sewage plant advocates might argue that reducing stages according to ADWF multiples (2X, 3X, 4X) is defensible because such large events are infrequent. Most of the time, the effluent discharged gets full treatment - tertiary supposedly. That said, while discharging effluent through the 6mm screens is commonly seen as "raw" discharge, thats only true for heavy metals and complex chemicals - not so much for organics. Sieving organics helps promote its integration into the environment - smaller, thin strings of feces break down faster in the high energy ocean environment. 

Some marine scientists do say that the current preliminary level of sewage treatment is virtually equal to primary or secondary level because of the combination of up-stream source controls, sieving screen, and the high-energy (ie fast continuous currents), high-volume receiving environment. Needless to say that such opinions are not currently supported by virtually any political leaders.  

 

Example quote: 

’ The scientific evidence to date is clear (Golder, 2005): ecological effects attributable to the outfalls are small in magnitude and limited in spatial extent, do not translate into major effects on ecosystem function, are similar to North American jurisdictions with primary/secondary treatment, and may be decreasing over time.

 - "Sewage treatment wasted – The Victoria (BC,Canada) example": https://pdfs.semanti...7dcfc233a7c.pdf

 

Diagram of ocean processes working on sewage, from the SETAC sewage report. (page 62).

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