Sustainable Infrastructure

Photo by Danny Smith

I attended the Southeastern Environmental Law and Regulation Conference in Destin, Florida on Friday. It is an annual event sponsored by the Environmental Law Section of the Alabama State Bar. (See: https://www.alabar.org/membership/sections/environmental-law/) Mike Brown of Bradley Arant Boult Cummings and Darren Gore, Director of the City of Murfreesboro, Tennessee Water and Sewer Department, were both speakers in a panel discussion on “Sustainable Infrastructure”. Their presentations explored the sustainability challenges faced by modern sanitary sewer systems in a world with growing water demands and shrinking water availability. Today’s stakeholders demand improved water quality. Finding economical solutions to sustainability problems is a challenge that I enjoy. In the graduate-level sustainability course that I teach and through my company, Primarium, LLC, I have helped companies and organizations address these challenges. The goal is to find solutions that improve environmental and social sustainability, reduce operational expense, and improve the entity’s “green” image. These types of win-win solutions are sustainable in the broadest sense of the term. The sustainability challenges faced by sanitary sewer system operators are indicative of the issues faced by other industries. Below is a summary and analysis of the issues discussed.

Water availability and assimilative capacity are two sides of the same coin. Water availability is a growing problem for public drinking water supplies and industrial water demands around the USA and particularly in the western part of the USA. Water availability is also a growing issue in the southeastern USA where water has always been viewed as an abundant resource. The projected demands for water are growing while availability remains static or in decline. As sanitary sewer systems expand to serve growing communities, greater receiving stream assimilative capacity is required to accept treated waste water and still meet state water quality standards; however, stream assimilative capacities remain static or are in decline. Innovative solutions are needed to address these oncoming problems.

Re-use of wastewater is a growing necessity. I imagine that a spaceship traveling to Mars someday is going to be reusing or recycling every drop of water for the long voyage. After flushing the space ship toilet, you probably would not want to think too much when you turn on the spaceship coffee maker later! According to panel discussions, we are beginning to need water reuse solutions here on Earth now. Wastewater is increasingly being used for irrigation purposes in lieu of using potable water. Darren shared as an example the case of a golf course saving significant water costs when they began to use industrial waste water instead of potable water for irrigation. The irrigation needs of a golf course are seasonal; however, there is increased and adequate assimilative capacity in the winter for the waste water without the summertime irrigation diversion. This is an example of a win-win sustainability solution.

Potable water reuse, like the spaceship example above, is becoming a growing reality. Darren reports that a significant portion of drinking water in San Diego, California, will consist of recycled waste water by the year 2035 under the city’s long-range goals. He says this will be a necessity for cities all over the country going forward. Society will certainly ask questions like whether current waste water treatment technologies can remove a host of pharmaceuticals and hormone treatments that end up in our sewer systems through human wastes.

Pollutant Trading. The idea of using a stream pollutant trading system, like an air cap and trade system, may be a solution to diminished assimilative capacity in some parts of the country. Under a trading system, nutrients might be removed from a stream via an engineered riparian wetland to allow nutrient discharges into the same stream from a sanitary sewer system.

STEP Systems. In some parts of the country, Septic Tank Effluent Pumping (STEP) systems are used where sewage flows from a home into a septic tank with the liquid effluent pumped into a public sanitary sewer system leaving the solid wastes in the septic tank. The benefit of STEP systems is that smaller waste water treatment facilities are required due to the reduced amount of solid wastes leaving homes. Nonetheless, solid wastes from the septic tanks must be managed at some point.

Federal Grants and Loans. Federal financial assistance is available for sanitary sewer systems to implement green infrastructure solutions. These types of sustainability solutions can help improve stream water quality and pull stream segments off the federal Clean Water Act 303(d) list of impaired streams.

Current sanitary sewer system sustainability challenges are not necessarily current legal issues; however, ... sewer system operators worry whether effluent receiving streams will continue to provide sufficient pollutant assimilative capacity in the future as stream water availability lessens over time. Communities are expanding and demanding greater waste water treatment capacity while society is increasingly demanding the highest water quality. The lack of stream assimilative capacity can limit economic development with respect to new water users. These factors cause water policy to evolve and eventually lead to new legal requirements.

It is important for sanitary sewer systems to stay abreast of and involved in policy and regulatory developments affecting their operations – An Alabama Example:Sanitary sewer system regulatory changes were recently proposed in the state Alabama. A rulemaking petition was submitted to the Alabama Environmental Management Commission requesting the Commission to amend ADEM Admin. Code § 335-6-6.12 to impose new minimum Sanitary Sewer Overflow (SSO) notification requirements. The petition was filed by Alabama River Alliance, Inc., Black Warrior Riverkeeper, Inc., Cahaba Riverkeeper, Inc., Choctawatchee Riverkeeper, Inc., Coosa Riverkeeper, Inc., Friends of Hurricane Creek, Little River Waterkeeper, Mobile Baykeeper, Inc., and Tennessee Riverkeeper, Inc. The petitioners don’t think the system operators are adequately notifying ADEM and the public whenever SSOs occur and want new comprehensive right-to-know regulations that would require operators to post signs warning the public immediately following an SSO. They also want an opt-in text message system to notify the public whenever an SSO occurs. System operators were not involved in drafting the rulemaking petition.

 Existing ADEM regulations require immediate SSO notifications to ADEM, health departments, and the public. After the initial notification, the operator must submit a report to ADEM within 5 days. ADEM is moving toward requiring that this report be submitted electronically via ADEM’s e-SSO system rather than manually. The public can access this information via ADEM’s website. ADEM would like to see these electronic notifications include latitude and longitude coordinates to provide real-time online notification.

 The Commission voted to deny the rulemaking petition and referred the matter to the AEMC rulemaking committee for further consideration because sewer system operators were not adequately involved in developing the proposed requirements. ADEM will likely develop and impose new SSO notification requirements as new permit conditions and a model notification plan may be developed. Sanitary sewer systems need to be involved in this policy making process.

Primarium can help.