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Sun Sentinel: Change in law could save South Florida utility ratepayers $1.3 billion by dumping sewage in the ocean

By Ariel Barkhurst, Sun Sentinel12:09 p.m. EST, February 23, 2012

A bill making its way through the Legislature would dump 5 billion gallons of treated sewage into the ocean every year, but save South Florida’s utility ratepayers at least $1.3 billion.

The bill changes a 2008 law that told utilities to completely stop flushing treated sewage into the ocean through pipes by 2025, to save coral reefs and marine ecosystems. A 2008 DEP study decided “the weight of the evidence” showed the sewage was harming South Florida’s coastal marine life.

The amendment allows utilities to pump a reduced amount of sewage into the ocean annually after the 2025 deadline. They could pipe out 5 percent of their annual sewage flow, which totals over 5 billion gallons a year. Right now, utilities pump a total of about 71 billion gallons of treated sewage into the ocean a year.

All the pipes affected by the bill, which is in the Senate Budget Committee and has passed the House unanimously, are located in Palm Beach, Broward and Miami-Dade counties. If the bill passes the committee, it goes to the full Senate, where it would be likely to pass.

“This is done in the best interest of the public, because it’s such significant savings to them,” said Alan Garcia, Broward’s water and wastewater director. “We’re still meeting most of the original goal.”

A University of Florida study in 2008 estimated that a household using an average of 7,500 gallons a month could pay an extra $19.80 per month if utilities have to shut down the pipes completely. That number would go down if this bill passes, utility directors said.

Miami-Dade would save $820 million, Hollywood $160 million and Broward County $300 million, utility directors said.

The change to the 2008 law doesn’t affect ratepayers in Palm Beach County as much. Delray Beach‘s pipe shut down in 2008 and Boca Raton has reduced its ocean flow by half, and plans to shut its pipe down by 2015.

The original ban also aimed to save reusable water from being lost into the ocean.

It told utilities to find a way to reuse 60 percent of sewage for irrigation, watering lawns and even recharging the drinking water aquifer. The amendment doesn’t change that.

But Divon Quirolo, founder of Reef Relief, an activist organization that pushed for the 2008 law, wonders whether utilities hope to slowly get out of the original law.

She cites the fact that the current bill also pushes back a deadline for utilities to have a permitted plan for meeting the law’s requirements from July 2013 to October 2014. None of the three utilities pushing for the bill has gotten beyond the planning stages of their major water reuse projects over the past four years.

“They’re trying to delay, avoid and weaken,” Quirolo said.

The reason South Florida would save so much money if utilities could pump just 5 percent of sewage out to sea has to do with “peak flow events,” utility directors said, which are heavy rains or other events that suddenly overburden regular sewage treatment systems.

Hollywood, Miami-Dade County and Broward County say they would have to build multimillion dollar wells to inject that “peak flow” into the ground unless they can just keep dumping into the Atlantic. They all already have wells to inject water into the ground, but would need another to deal with peak flow.

While the amendment is good news for anyone with a sewage bill in Broward or Miami-Dade counties, the change is bad news for fish, coral and beaches.

Saving reefs and ecosystems was a major reason lawmakers passed the 2008 law.

Many scientists say the treated sewage, which contains chemicals from human pharmaceuticals and bathrooms products and nutrients that can cause algae blooms, has destroyed the ocean environment off South Florida’s coasts.

The water is screened of solids but doesn’t meet standards for watering a lawn or a field of crops.

“When the money isn’t there, the government wants to argue there’s no need for it,” said Matthew Schwartz, environmental activist and executive director of the South Florida Wildlands Association. “Meanwhile, our coral reefs and marine ecosystems are being destroyed.”

The amendment was sponsored by representatives and senators from Miami-Dade and Broward counties.

But since Delray Beach shut down its pipe in 2008, it has had to open it again on three occasions.

They’ve pumped out about 1 percent a year out to sea, “nowhere near 5 percent,” said Dennis Coates, executive director of the plant.

Still, he does hope to keep pumping that much after the deadline. They wouldn’t need nearly 5 percent, but for peak flows it would be nice to use the ocean pipe.

“This change allows us to not build a duplicate injection system that we would use a few days a year,” Garcia said. “That gives us a lot more efficiency for our dollars.”

abarkhurst@tribune.com or 954-356-4451

Conservation Community Unites to oppose Fla Senate Bill 724, Domestic Wastewater Discharged Through Ocean Outfalls

This bill, if passed, will weaken the Outfall Legislation passed by the Florida Legislature 4 years ago which gave municipalities in Dade, Broward and Palm Beach Counties 10 years to phase out ocean outfalls that reduced water quality for the area’s coral reefs. They were mandated to implement advanced wastewater treatment and re-use that would be beneficial because it would increase much-needed fresh water supplies.  Now efforts are underway once again to weaken these standards and allow some pollution to be discharged on the coral reefs that support the area’s dive and tourism industry.  We don’t need more closed beaches; we need clean water for the corals to thrive.  This is an ideal opportunity to begin needed infrastructure projects that will boost the economy as well.  Now is not the time—vote no on this bill. Please add your name and send in your own letter to the Senators listed below.     DeeVon

 

From: Reef Rescue <etichscuba@aol.com>
To: alexander.jd.web <alexander.jd.web@flsenate.gov>; altman.thad.web <altman.thad.web@flsenate.gov>; benacquisto.lizbeth.web <benacquisto.lizbeth.web@flsenate.gov>; bennett.mike.web <bennett.mike.web@flsenate.gov>; bogdanoff.ellyn.web <bogdanoff.ellyn.web@flsenate.gov>; braynon.oscar.web <braynon.oscar.web@flsenate.gov>; bullard.larcenia.web <bullard.larcenia.web@flsenate.gov>; dean.charles.web <dean.charles.web@flsenate.gov>; detert.nancy.web <detert.nancy.web@flsenate.gov>; dockery.paula.web <dockery.paula.web@flsenate.gov>; evers.greg.web <evers.greg.web@flsenate.gov>; fasano.mike.web <fasano.mike.web@flsenate.gov>; flores.anitere.web <flores.anitere.web@flsenate.gov>; gaetz.don.web <gaetz.don.web@flsenate.gov>; garcia.rene.web <garcia.rene.web@flsenate.gov>; gardiner.andy.web <gardiner.andy.web@flsenate.gov>; gibson.audrey.web <gibson.audrey.web@flsenate.gov>; haridopolos.mike.web <haridopolos.mike.web@flsenate.gov>; hays.alan.web <hays.alan.web@flsenate.gov>; jones.dennis.web <jones.dennis.web@flsenate.gov>; joyner.arthenia.web <joyner.arthenia.web@flsenate.gov>; latvala.jack.web <latvala.jack.web@flsenate.gov>; lynn.evelyn.web <lynn.evelyn.web@flsenate.gov>; margolis.gwen.web <margolis.gwen.web@flsenate.gov>; montford.bill.web <montford.bill.web@flsenate.gov>; negron.joe.web <negron.joe.web@flsenate.gov>; norman.jim.web <norman.jim.web@flsenate.gov>; oelrich.steve.web <oelrich.steve.web@flsenate.gov>; norman.jim.web <norman.jim.web@flsenate.gov>; oelrich.steve.web <oelrich.steve.web@flsenate.gov>; rich.nan.web <rich.nan.web@flsenate.gov>; richter.garrett.web <richter.garrett.web@flsenate.gov>; ring.jeremy.web <ring.jeremy.web@flsenate.gov>; sachs.maria.web <sachs.maria.web@flsenate.gov>; simmons.david.web <simmons.david.web@flsenate.gov>; siplin.gary.web <siplin.gary.web@flsenate.gov>; smith.chris.web <smith.chris.web@flsenate.gov>; sobel.eleanor.web <sobel.eleanor.web@flsenate.gov>; storms.ronda.web <storms.ronda.web@flsenate.gov>; thrasher.john.web <thrasher.john.web@flsenate.gov>; wise.stephen.web <wise.stephen.web@flsenate.gov>
Sent: Thu, Feb 23, 2012 9:06 am
Subject: Senate Bill 724, Domestic Wastewater Discharged Through Ocean Outfalls

 

Clean Water Network of Florida,                                            February 23, 2012                                   
Cry-of-the-Water,
Eastern Surfing Association,
Global Coral Reef Alliance,
Greater Fort Lauderdale Dive Operators Association,
Nature Travelers Club,
Ocean Rehab Initiative Inc.,
Palm Beach County Dive Industry Association,
Palm Beach County Reef Rescue,
Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility,
Surfrider Foundation,
Reef Relief,
Reef Relief Founders
 
Re: Senate Bill 724, Domestic Wastewater Discharged Through Ocean Outfalls
 
Dear Senator:
We, the undersigned ocean advocacy, industry and conservation organizations, on behalf of our ten’s of thousands of members and supporters strongly urge you not to support Senate Bill 724 (Domestic Wastewater Discharged Through Ocean Outfalls). SB 724 is intended to delay implementation of the 2008 Florida Ocean Outfall legislation which was enacted to phase out the archaic practice of discharging inadequately treated sewage into southeast Florida’s coastal coral reef ecosystem.
According to the Florida Department of Environmental Protection, 239,000 acres of coral reefs and associated reef resources lie within the four-county area affected by SB 724. This northern portion of the Florida Reef Tract stretches more than100 miles from the northern boundary of Biscayne National Park in Miami-Dade County to the St. Lucie Inlet in Martin County. These reefs are part of the third longest reef system in the world which annually sustains more than 71,000 jobs and generates $6.3 billion dollars in sales and income for Florida. (http://www.dep.state.fl.us/secretary/news/2009/02/files/0212_02.pdf)
 
Florida’s corals are dying at an alarming rate; between 1996 and 2001 the Keys experienced a 40 percent decrease in coral cover. Since the 1980’s, 97% of Florida’s Staghorn and Elkhorn reef building corals have died prompting the federal government to elevate these species to threatened status under the Endangered Species Act. Recent studies have linked Elkhorn coral white pox disease with Serratia marcescens, a human pathogen found in sewage, (Sutherland KP, Shaban S, Joyner JL, Porter JW, Lipp EK (2011) Human Pathogen Shown to Cause Disease in the Threatened Eklhorn Coral Acropora palmata. PLoS ONE 6(8): e23468. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0023468).
Along with the mix of nutrient pollution and pathogens spewing from south Florida’s ocean outfalls, EPA reports Personal Care Products and Pharmaceuticals (PCPP’s) now represent and ever increasing threat to the environment. Recent studies have found Prozac in fish organs and disrupted sexual development in fish cause by estrogen.
The 2008 Florida Ocean Outfall legislation was not all about saving coral reefs. A key driver of the legislation was the need to conserve water in south Florida. Water needed for agriculture, population growth and Everglades restoration. The southeast counties have one of the lowest water reclamation and reuse records in Florida. Everyday 396,000,000 gallons of wastewater is discharged into the coastal waters of Palm Beach, Broward and Miami-Dade counties. The 2008 legislation mandates that 60% of this wastewater be allocated for reuse.
We strongly urge you not to turn back the clock; time is running out for Florida’s coral reefs. Please vote no on SB 724.
Sincerely,
Clean Water Network of Florida
Linda Young, Director
 
Cry-of-the-Water
Dan Clark, President
 
Eastern Surfing Association National Head Quarters
Eastern Surfing Association South Florida District
Eastern Surfing Association Palm Beach County District
Tom Warnke, Chairman of the Board
 
Global Coral Reef Alliance
Thomas J. Goreau, PhD, President
 
Greater Fort Lauderdale Diving Association
Jeff Torode, President
 
Nature Travelers Club, Delray Beach
Hope Fox, President
 
Ocean Rehab Initiative Inc.
William Djubin, President
 
Palm Beach County Dive Industry Association
Van Blakeman, Director
 
Palm Beach County Reef Rescue
Ed Tichenor, Director
 
PEER, Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility
Jerry Phillips, Director Florida Chapter
 
Surfrider Foundation
Miami Chapter
Broward Chapter
Treasure Coast Chapter
Sebastian Inlet Chapter
Cocoa Beach Chapter
Volusia Flagler Chapter
First Coast Chapter
Suncoast Chapter
Central Florida Chapter
Emerald Coast Chapter
Ericka Canales, Florida Regional Manager
 
Surfrider Foundation Palm Beach County Chapter
Todd Remmel, Chapter Chair
 
Reef Relief
Peter Anderson, Chairman & President
 
Reef Relief Founders
Craig & DeeVon Quirolo
Special thanks to Reef Rescue of Palm Beach.   Learn more and read their action alert at:  http://reefrescuealert.wordpress.com/
 

 

Elevate the Gulf: Interview with Mark Spalding, President of The Ocean Foundation

Submitted by elevate on February 22, 2012 – 12:43 pm

On April 9, 2012, Elevate Destinations and The Ocean Foundation will bring a team of volunteers to the Gulf Coast to participate in a week long service trip to help revitalize an eco-system that was devastated by the BP oil spill. These travelers will take part in restoration of the oyster reef, seagrass bed and coastal marsh habitats while experiencing the culture and culinary arts of this unique destination!

 

 

 

 

 

Mark Spalding (photo courtesy of The Ocean Foundation) will be joining this team to participate first-hand in this incredible opportunity and partnership. Not only is Mark the president of The Ocean Foundation, but he is also a practicing lawyer and policy consultant. In the past he has worked with organizations like the Consultative Group on Biological Diversity, the International Bering Sea Forum, the Council of the National Whale Conservation Fund, the Alaska Conservation Foundation, the San Diego Foundation, the International Community Foundation, the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation, Fundacion La Puerta, and a number of family foundations. Because of this work, Mark is seen as a major contributor to some f the most significant ocean conservation campaigns in recent years.

The Elevate Destinations team was lucky to catch up with Mark to get his thoughts on his work with The Ocean Foundation and the upcoming Elevate the Gulf trip. Below is a transcript of our interview. A big thank you to Mark for your time and your contribution to the oceans of the world! We cannot wait for April to get here!

How did you become involved with the Ocean Foundation?

Back when the Ocean Foundation was created, I was a professor in the International Relations program at UC San Diego, and like many faculty members, I took some consulting jobs on the side to pay the rent.  Many of those jobs involved international conservation objectives, in particular international ocean conservation and occasionally, international ocean conservation and philanthropy.  So some folks found me and asked if I would I help design the Ocean Foundation and I agreed to do so.  We built the whole thing around a set of models of community foundations, obviously in our case without a geographic set of boundaries and in our case with a very narrow subject matter.  Once I got done designing it, they offered me the opportunity to run it and eight years later, here I am!

With the oceans being a non-geographic area in terms of national ownership, what do you think is the biggest challenge that your foundation faces in terms of conservation?

I think the big thing that we face, that any of us in ocean conservation faces, is that no one lives in the ocean. At best our view of the ocean is very surface.  Sadly that means if you are out on a deck having drinks looking out over the ocean, it doesn’t look different if all the fish are gone and the sea grass is dead and all of the coral reefs are dead.  The water is still there, the color of the sunset is still the same, and the sounds of the waves are probably still the same.  It’s getting people more connected to the fact that a tremendous amount of protein comes from the ocean, half of our oxygen supply comes from the ocean, and a whole lot of other functions of the ocean protect us from extreme cold and extreme heat, sequestered carbon and all of those ecosystems services are irreplaceable and yet out of sight.  They just aren’t at the forefront of people’s minds.


What are some unexpected human actions that directly affect the health of our oceans?

Well the biggest threat to the ocean is climate change.  Therefore all of our use of vehicles and consumption that results from the burning of fossil fuels is contributing to climate change, which in turn is changing the ocean’s chemistry, circulation patterns, and temperature.  So that’s the biggest thing that we all do.  In addition, we as people have done a pretty poor job of managing our fisheries so over-fishing of the ocean has been a severe human impact on the ocean.  Third is basic pollution, and while climate change is related to pollution as well, and the carbon going into the ocean is a pollutant per se, when we talk about pollution we are talking about plastics and oils and all that stuff in the ocean that just shouldn’t be there.  I’ll often say we really have two problems with the ocean.  We take too much out and put too much back in and all we have to do is stop taking too much good stuff out and stop putting too much bad stuff in.  It all boils down to that.

How does your work with the Ocean Foundation, and perhaps Elevate’s upcoming trip to the Gulf, attempt to combat these problems?

Fundamentally what we need to do is restore the resilience of the ocean.  We need to reverse the harm done to the ocean, which is basically our mission statement at the Ocean Foundation.  So looking at something like this trip, if we can replace oysters and have the reefs that they at one time occupied be rebuilt, all of those systems in front of and behind those reefs could recover.  Many of those systems recover quite naturally without us doing much else.  Thus we will have oysters as filter feeders, cleaning the water, and making it possible for other plants and animals to survive in these places.  We will have more marsh grasses growing which will take up carbon out of the atmosphere and sequester it, which will be a good thing when dealing with climate change.  And we’ll have a healthier place.  We have had dramatic things that happened like the BP oil disaster in the Gulf, but you know, we have, for a long time, been damaging the Gulf with a little prick here, a little cut there: a relocation here, building a pier there.  The old saying, a death by a thousand cuts is really what we are seeing here and we have the opportunity now to react.  I think this is truly about the future and it gives us something to work on.  This gives us hope.  Therefore the restoration of the ocean’s capacity to do things for us, again, ecosystem services stuff, is something positive that we can be doing about our future and our children and grandchildren’s futures.


Because oceans are so seemingly disconnected from our daily lives, ocean conservation is the most difficult form of conservation for sustaining hope and I think that’s the most dangerous part about its long-term restoration.

Yes, I think that’s right.  There was this assumption on one hand that it was so big that the resources in it were so big that we could take anything we wanted.  And that it was so big that dumping oil in it here or there couldn’t do it any harm.  So there was this blithe assumption that it was so big and so powerful that we couldn’t do it any harm.  And ironically now, it flips, right?  The change that we have brought is so big and so powerful that it seems intimidating to try and do anything about it.  But we have to undo the harm the same way we did the harm, one little bit at a time.

How did you originally become involved with Elevate?

I actually went on a trip that was sponsored by a charter club, The Center for Responsible Tourism, and met the Executive Director of Elevate.  Dominique and I learned that we had a lot of interests in common and that we had a lot of opportunities for collaboration.  So we have been looking for those opportunities ever since and I am really excited that this came together!

What are you most looking forward to during your trip to the Gulf this year?

I am looking forward to being out of the office, being out of Washington D.C. and getting out into some of the places that we care about.  I am looking forward to seeing old friends and colleagues in the Gulf area that we work with or support, but I also am really excited because this is an opportunity for new friends to come along with us on a trip and see what a beautiful place this is.  To help us restore it and make it even more beautiful, as beautiful as it was before we messed it up.  We have to start somewhere working on restoration, we have to accomplish some things and if we don’t we are fundamentally failing ourselves going forward.  I am not ready to give up and I am not ready to feel overwhelmed.  Getting started on this now is the time to do it.

For more details on the trip and how to get involved please visit the Elevate Destinations website or contact info@elevatedestinations.com. Reserve your  space now as April is just around the corner.

 

 

MiamiHerald.com: Utilities seek break on ocean flushing

Posted on Friday, 01.27.12

Read more here: http://www.miamiherald.com/2012/01/27/2612159_utilities-seek-break-on-ocean.html#storylink=addthis#storylink=cpy

Environment

Citing more than $1 billion in costs, Miami-Dade and Broward utilities are pushing a bill that would let them continue to use ocean outfalls as back-up for big sewage days

By CURTIS MORGAN

CMorgan@MiamiHerald.com

Four years ago, Florida ordered utilities in Miami-Dade, Broward and Palm Beach counties to phase out the decades-long practice of pumping some 300 million gallons a day of sewage into the Atlantic Ocean.

Two bills under consideration by the Legislature would push back the deadline for upgrading pollution treatment for the ocean outfalls by two years to 2020 and keep the pipelines flowing after a shutdown deadline of 2025 — but mainly as occasional relief valves.

South Florida utility managers contend the changes would result in big savings for customers and produce little environmental impact.

The bill would cap the annual flow at 5 percent of current volumes. That’s enough, utility managers say, to help them handle sporadic “peak flow” events when heavy storms can quickly triple the typical volume flowing from toilets and sinks. Building injections wells and treatment systems to handle those peaks could cost $1 billion-plus, they say.

“There is just a huge expenditure for that last 5 percent,’’ said, Doug Yoder, deputy director of the Miami-Dade Water and Sewer Department. “This is a very clear example of the point of diminishing returns.’’

Miami-Dade estimates it would cost the county $820 million to build injection wells, treatment systems and other projects to meet the current law.

Alan Garcia, director of Broward’s water and wastewater services, echoed the view, saying that the county would have to spend an estimated $300 million on deep wells and treatment to handle peak discharges.

“The reality is we might have only 20 or 30 days a year when we’d be using those wells,’’ Garcia said.

The City of Hollywood estimates the change would save it $142 million in construction costs.

Utilities have long defended the outfalls, saying the sewage was quickly diluted as currents carried it away from outfalls one to three miles offshore in 90 to 100 feet of water. But environmentalists and scuba divers, supported by many scientists, pushed state environmental regulators for years to halt the ocean dumping, arguing that the practice had tainted reefs, marine life and beaches.

The stuff that flows out of five remaining pipelines is screened of its foulest components but isn’t clean enough to sprinkle on a lawn and is rich in nutrients, nitrogen and phosphorus that can trigger explosions of damaging algae that have been found on Southeast Florida reefs.

The Department of Environmental Protection, in a 2008 report, didn’t make a direct link between sewage and reef damage but said the “weight of the evidence… calls into question the environmental acceptability.”

Efforts by the utilities to water down or delay deadlines in the last few years have stalled in the Legislature. The current proposals —a House version sponsored Reps. Erik Fresen, R-Miami, and Eddy Gonzalez, R-Hialeah, and identical Senate bill introduced by Sen. Miguel Diaz de la Portilla, R-Miami-Dade — have sailed through committees without opposition or criticism from environmental groups.

The Florida Department of Environmental Protection also supports the bill, said spokeswoman Dee Ann Miller. The changes would give utilities more flexibility, she said, reduce costs and ease rate hikes for customers.

The proposal would also give utilities two additional years — until 2020 — to install advanced treatment systems that were designed to reduce nutrient volumes until the outfalls would be closed in 2025. Both Miami-Dade and Broward are taking other measures to meet the nutrient standards to avoid having to install those expensive systems — diverting sewage flows or using other treatments to reduce nutrients.

“Nobody wanted to build expensive facilities that would not be needed after seven years,’’ said Miami-Dade’s Yoder.

The 5 percent limit on ocean dumping would apply on a yearly basis, meaning that on those days of high demand the pipes could flow to permitted capacity. That’s about 37 million gallons a day for Broward and 196 million a day for the two Miami-Dade pipelines.

Read more here: http://www.miamiherald.com/2012/01/27/2612159_utilities-seek-break-on-ocean.html#storylink=addthis#storylink=cpy

 

Special thanks to Reef Rescue

Florida Coastal and Ocean Coalition: Updated Blueprint released

http://flcoastalandocean.org/blueprint

 

Blueprint

Blueprint Update

The Florida Coastal and Ocean Coalition addresses the most pressing issues affecting Florida’s coastal and marine environments in Florida’s Coastal and Ocean Future: An Updated Blueprint for Economic and Environmental Leadership. This report updates the Coalition’s previous document, Florida’s Coastal and Ocean Future: A Blueprint for Economic and Environmental Leadership, and recommends actions for protecting and restoring Florida’s natural resources and economic engine.

Major topics include: Lessons Learned from the BP Oil Spill and Steps Needed for Restoration; Protecting the Coast; Florida’s Marine Ecosystems, Fisheries, and Wildlife; Restoring The Quality of Our Coastal Waters; Achieving Our Ocean Priorities – Developing the Tools to Plan For a Healthy Future for Out Coasts and Oceans.