Wednesday, August 26, 2009
By SCOTT SUNDE
SEATTLEPI.COM
Seattle and King County will have to come up with ways to reduce dumping sewage into lakes, rivers and Puget Sound during heavy rain storms, the Environmental Protection Agency announced Wednesday.
The EPA reached the agreements with the two local governments as part of compliance orders issued Wednesday. The orders address violations of Seattle and King County of their discharge permits.
Every year 1.94 billion gallons of untreated sewage and polluted runoff from Seattle and King County are discharged into the sound and other bodies of water as a result of overflows.
"We know that sewer overflows regularly deliver harmful pollution to Puget Sound," Michelle Pizadeh, the EPA's acting administrator said in a statement. "What we are requiring the city and county is clear: They must take steps to reduce the volume and frequency of overflows. We must make sure our treatment plants are doing their best to reduce the amount of untreated wastewater entering Puget Sound waters."
Both local governments have combined sewers that carry sewage and storm water to treatment plants. A heavy rain can dump more water than the system can handle. The extra water is piped or pumped into area bodies of water. It has little or no treatment.
The city has 92 overflow locations and King County has 38. These sites dump untreated water during heavy rains into Lake Union, Lake Washington, the Duwamish River and Puget Sound.
The EPA says Seattle's system overflowed 247 times in 2007 and King County's 87 times.
The federal agency said the local governments already have added storage to reduce overflows.
In addition, the EPA has ordered Seattle to focus on violations found in March 2008 investigation. The city has to come up with an emergency response plan, a plan to ensure the collection system is cleaned in a more systematic way and a plan to create more storage.
Seattle will also have to find ways to reduce basement backups and dry weather overflows. The city has to be in compliance with the order by March 2012.
King County will have improve the Elliott West plant, which handles combined sewage overflows, to make sure they are properly treated. It must also observe and document outfalls after a rain to make sure debris aren't being discharged.
The county must be in compliance by March 2010.