www.mybaycity.com
April 4, 2003
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SEWAGE DISCHARGES INTO RIVER CONTINUE, BUT CALLED UNAVOIDABLE, SAFE
Can't Handle Heavy Rains |
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Overflow discharge portal for the collection basin under Wenona Band Shell.
Sewage discharges continue in the Saginaw River despite an estimated $80 million investment by the City of Saginaw in treatment facilities in recent years. However, officials say the discharges meet permit allowances and cause minimal health hazards.
The latest discharge was 3.3 million gallons of partially treated sewage from the Weiss Street retention basin in Saginaw on March 29, according to a report by Wayne A. Kruse, operations foreman of the Saginaw Wastewater Treatment department. Rainfall at the level of 0.61 inch caused the discharge, he said.
Similar discharges continue to occur three to five times a year because Saginaw has a combined storm and sanitary sewage treatment system, according to Gene Suuppi, environmental analyst at the Saginaw-Bay District office of the Michigan Department of Environmental Quality.
"The overflow is triggered automatically when there is intense rainfall," said Suuppi. "Normally, this sewage has been chlorinated (disinfected with the chemical chlorine)." This is equal to primary treatment, he said, while waste water usually gets secondary treatment to remove any health hazards before discharge into the river.
"This is not raw sewage," said Rick Dryzga, director of the Bay County Health Department. "The discharges still occur from Saginaw, Bay City and Essexville, but not as often as in the past. But there is very little health hazard by the time it gets (from Saginaw) to us since it is highly diluted as it goes down river." He said bathing beach monitoring in the Saginaw River and Bay and the Kawkawlin River show that water quality is better than ever.
All three municipalities have combined treatment facilities, meaning storm water and sewage are treated together, Dryzga explained. And all three systems experience overflows.
"We could never build systems big enough to handle every rain; we just couldn't afford it," he added.
John Kolessar, PE, director of engineering and public infrastructure for the City of Bay City, said the city built five diversion chambers for storm water so the clear water could be diverted from the treatment system. One of the chambers is a huge basin under Wenonah Park downtown.
"Ninety nine out of 100 times the water is there for a day and the waste water plant catches up," he said. Saginaw has seven retention basins. Flint, from which discharges can affect water here, also has installed infrastructure in recent years to control problems. Two years ago a contractor broke a pipe in Flint and a discharge occurred, but no other events have occurred since then in Flint, he said.
In the event of a discharge, by law any incident in which chlorinated waste overflows the retention basin must be reported to communities and news media both upstream and downstream, said Kolessar.
"We report when we violate and we haven't had any fines," said the city engineer. "I believe Bay City meets the permit requirements, and Saginaw does, too."
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