WEST FORK — City officials said they will likely close a 41-year-old sewage treatment plant and look to link with Fayetteville’s treatment system because the plant repeatedly violates pollution standards set by state and federal laws.
“Any decision that’s made involving shutting down our plant and getting new bonds and tying onto Fayetteville affects this City Council,” Mayor Frances Hime said during a special meeting Thursday.
Officials with the state Department of Environmental Quality told Hime and Butch Bartholomew, water and wastewater superintendent, on Wednesday the treatment plant continues to exceed discharge limits of pollutants into the west fork of the White River.
The department recorded 45 pollution violations since 2009, after monitoring stations in the river detected high levels of pollutants including ammonia nitrogen, which deprives oxygen from water, and fecal coliform, or bacteria that grows from human waste, according to data from the department.
“Mainly it’s ammonia nitrogen,” said Mo Shafii, assistant chief of the city’s water division. “It could be toxic if they discharge at high levels. It could be toxic to aquatic life.”
The plant’s permit to operate expired April 30. Department off cials, while reviewing the city’s renewal application in Little Rock, gave Hime and Bartholomew a two-week deadline to either correct the pollutant discharge, build a new plant or link to Fayetteville’s, Hime said. The city then has three months to develop a plan.
“The (city’s) system is more than 40 years old,” said Katherine Benenati, Arkansas Department of Environmental Quality spokeswoman. “As far as ADEQ is concerned, they’re not going to meet their limits without upgrading their treatment system.”
Upgrading the plant to meet standards is nearly impossible because the plant lies on floodplain and wasn’t designed to fi lter ammonia nitrogen, Bartholomew said.
“Asking this old plant to do what these new regulations (require) is like taking a riding lawnmower to try and pull a fl atbed 18-wheeler full of steel,” Bartholomew told the council. “You just can’t do it.”
The plant will be able to continue to operate as long as city officials show progress to a solution, Bartholomew said.
He said after the council meeting he’s been sending reports to the state showing levels of pollutants higher than state standards since the plant renewed its permit five years ago. That’s when the state started making the city regulate ammonia nitrogen, he said.
Ammonia nitrogen averaged 2.5 times more than the permitted level, according to the state. The state recorded the highest level in August 2011 when it found 29.5 milligrams per liter. The limit that month was 3.9 meaning the plant discharged 7.5 times more.
Building a plant at a dift erent location could cost between $15 million and $20 million with no guarantee the department would grant a permit to operate the new facility, Bartholomew said. That’s partly because Fayetteville’s sewage treatment system, which also discharges in the same river, is nearby, he said.
Hime said linking to Fayetteville’s system would likely be the only option. The city hasn’t yet determined how the move would impact rates charged to residents, she said.
Opinion, Pages 6 on 06/29/2012