Clean Water Advocacy - Newsroom - AMSA in the News
Eye On The Chesapeake
by LAMAR SESSOMS JR - Saltwater Editor
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Poultry Firms Block Regulations
Md's plan to hold giant poultry companies responsible for controlling pollution
from the waste their birds produce has been blocked by the courts who say the
state over-stepped its authority in linking the companies' permits to disposal
of manure.
The judge ruled in favor of Perdue Farms, Tyson Foods and Allen Foods who would
have been required to give state authorities a list of the farmers who raise
birds for them, specify the amounts of manure generated and indicate how the
manure will be used. Only the plants where the companies process chickens can be
regulated.
Runoff from fields fertilized with poultry manure has been the cause for putting
excess nutrients in Maryland waters and promoting the growth of a toxic microbe,
Pfiesteria piscicida, in several Eastern Shore rivers in 1997.
Clean Water's Future Problems
Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Christine Todd Whitman warned that
demands for improved wastewater and drinking water treatment systems could
outstrip current spending by $535 billion over the next two decades. Whitman
said that while the country has made huge strides in cleaning up rivers, streams
and other waterways since the passage of the 1972 Clean Water Act, state and
local governments face enormous challenges in maintaining and replacing
deteriorating water treatment systems.
"Much of America's drinking and wastewater infrastructure is aging," Whitman
said in an address to the Water Environment Federation in Chicago. "There are
cities in America still using pipes that were laid when Lincoln was president."
According to Whitman, capital spending and maintenance needs for wastewater
treatment will exceed current spending levels by $270 billion through 2019,
while demands for improved drinking water treatment facilities will exceed
current spending by more than $265 billion over the same period. Municipal and
regional governments, which finance 90 percent of water treatment systems, will
have to boost spending by three percent a year over the rate of inflation to
avert the massive projected spending gap, the study found.
Ken Kirk, executive director of the Association of Metropolitan Sewerage
Agencies, said the EPA study is in line with industry findings and highlights
the need for "a serious, long-term [financial] commitment from the federal
government."
Water treatment industry leaders have urged Congress and the Bush administration
to support long-term federal funding for programs focusing on core water and
wastewater infrastructure needs.
Over the past two decades, communities have spent $1 trillion on drinking water
treatment and supply, and wastewater treatment and disposal. While this spending
has been substantial, it may not be sufficient to keep pace with an expanding
and geographically shifting population, according to experts. In recent decades,
the federal government has provided more than $19.7 billion in capital funding
to states for wastewater treatment projects and $3.6 billion for clean drinking
water programs, according to the EPA.
Treatment plants typically have an expected useful life of 20 to 50 years before
they must be expanded or rehabilitated, while pipes have life spans ranging from
15 years to well over 100 years. Some East Coast cities have pipes in use that
are almost 200 years old.
"The magnitude of the challenge America faces is clearly beyond the ability of
any one entity to address," Whitman said. "It will require the participation and
contribution of government at all levels, utilities and users."
Anglers Be Aware-New Potomac Anti-Terrorist Boat
Boating anglers should keep an eye out for a new boat patrolling the Potomac
River. A U.S. Coast Guard boat with twin machine gun mounts began patrolling the
Anacostia and Potomac rivers last month, the first time in decades the Coast
Guard has permanently stationed a boat in the Washington area.
The vessel, 25 feet long with a crew of four, was unveiled yesterday morning at
a ceremony near Coast Guard national headquarters in Southwest. Dubbed a
"homeland security" boat, it cost about $175,000 and is the first of 26 such
vessels the Coast Guard plans to have across the country, according to Cmdr. Jim
McPherson, a Coast Guard spokesman.
Washington received the first one, he said, because it had no other Coast Guard
presence and because the area's bridges and shallow waterways made the boat a
"perfect fit." Along with an older, slower 41-foot vessel that will be used for
backup, the new boat will be docked at an undisclosed local military
installation, he said.
Before the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, the Coast Guard had focused primarily on
search-and-rescue and drug interdiction. With relatively little of either on the
D.C. area's waterways, and not much shipping activity in the Potomac, the Coast
Guard had not stationed boats in the river for years, McPherson said.
But the terrorist attacks changed the mission of the Coast Guard overnight,
suddenly there was a lot to do in the D.C. area, where so much of the city's
monumental core is laid out close to the two rivers. In the past year, using
boats brought by trailer from Annapolis, the Coast Guard has stopped, searched
or checked 2,000 boats in intermittent patrols in the vicinity of Washington, he
said. "We wanted to guard the water gateway to the capital, and we needed a
permanent presence here," McPherson said.
Harbor patrol boats belonging to the D.C. police have long patrolled the Potomac
and the Anacostia, and Maryland Natural Resources police have jurisdiction over
the Potomac along that state's border. But Coast Guard officers have an
advantage, McPherson said, because they can demand to board any boat, while
police must first have probable cause.
The new homeland security boat, which is unnamed because the Coast Guard does
not christen boats less than 65 feet, is equipped with several features. The gun
mounts at the front and rear can accommodate an M-60 machine gun, the only Coast
Guard boat of this size capable of carrying such a weapon, McPherson said. The
boat also has two 225-horsepower engines with a top speed of 44 knots -- the
equivalent of about 51 miles per hour. Its very low clearance allows the boat to
slide under low bridges, and it is built to venture into shallow water. The boat
also has an enclosed cabin, which can protect the crew from the freezing winds
that bothered boat crews on the Potomac last winter, he said.
The boat will patrol for several hours every day and be on 24-hour call,
McPherson said. He said that the Coast Guard might build a permanent home for
the boats in the area in the future.
Does Wilson Bridge Pollutes Potomac?
A lawsuit is being filed by a labor union that the contractor building the
foundation for the new Woodrow Wilson Bridge has violated federal clean-water
rules and polluted the Potomac River.
The International Union of Operating Engineers, which represents heavy-equipment
operators, alleged that the joint venture of Tidewater, Kiewit & Clark has
committed at least eight violations of the Clean Water Act repeatedly. The
alleged violations include washing pollutants such as oil, gasoline and concrete
from barge decks, conveyor belts and construction equipment into the river.
Edwin McLaughlin, president of Virginia Beach-based Tidewater Skanska Inc.,
dismissed the allegations and said the venture had not violated any permits. The
union has an agenda to "put pressure" on Tidewater, he said, because it uses
nonunion labor.
John Undeland, a spokesman for the Wilson project, said work on the bridge is
inspected regularly by federal and state environmental officials. He said there
have been minor infractions, which have been corrected. The contractors have
taken precautions to keep material out of the river, he said.
Union spokesman David Miller said the group has evidence of violations and is
not trying to apply pressure for using nonunion labor. The union wrote that it
intended to seek civil penalties of up to $27,500 a day for each violation since
June 1, 2001.
Atlantic Tuna Threatened by European Nations
According to the International Commission for the Conservation of Atlantic Tunas
(ICCAT), the Atlantic bluefin tuna stock is far below its historic biomass
level. Representatives of the European Community have proposed an increase in
quota for their Eastern Atlantic bluefin tuna fishermen. Tuna have been found to
travel across the North Atlantic, even entering the Mediterranean Sea, sometimes
more than once a year.
The United States has opposed the increase. "We took a tough stance to protect
Atlantic bluefin tuna stocks because we could not accept a harvest level that is
clearly inconsistent with scientific advice," said Rolland Schmitten, one of the
commissioners and director of the Office of Habitat Protection in the National
Marine Fisheries Service. The US commercial, recreational fishing groups; and
environmental, conservation organizations have worked through the ICCAT to adopt
a recovery plan that has successfully arrested the decline of the Western
Atlantic bluefin tuna stock. "It is now time for Eastern Atlantic fishing
countries to adopt similar management steps in the face of the scientific
evidence."
Bay Watershed Cleanup Gets $1.2 Million
The EPA will provide $1.2 million in grants to help clean up the Chesapeake Bay
watershed, members of MD's congressional delegation announced. 31
community-based organizations will get the money to help develop and implement
watershed management plans. The program, which is in its fifth year, is designed
to rally local communities around the restoration and protection of their part
of the Chesapeake Bay Watershed.
The proposed projects are reviewed by the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation
and are selected based on criteria paralleling commitments set forth in the
Chesapeake 2000 Agreement. Selected projects range from citizen water quality
monitoring to planting trees to oyster gardening.