Second Guessing Secondary Treatment
The July signing of a massive consent decree between the City and County of Honolulu and a group of federal, state and environmental agencies means the next quarter-century of city leaders will be tasked with implementing the terms of that deal.
The decree has been widely lauded as a step in the right direction after previous mayoral administrations failed to keep the system up to snuff. Most recently, former Mayor Jeremy Harris diverted more than $100 million out of the sewer fund for Waikiki beautification projects.
But some with knowledge of wastewater treatment argue a portion of the deal is unnecessary, and will cost Honolulu at least $1 billion to implement. It’s part of a decades-long debate over secondary wastewater treatment in Honolulu.
The topic is likely to come up this afternoon, when the Public Infrastructure Committee discusses Mayor Peter Carlisle‘s nomination for the director of the Environmental Services Department, Tim Steinberger.
Secondary-treatment will also be on the minds of Honolulu City Council members as they decide what kinds of sewage fee hikes are necessary for the coming years. Even though Honolulu is legally required to upgrade to secondary treatment, naysayers are still out there.
“We had two major problems that we needed to deal with,” said Hugh Barroll, the U.S. Environment Protection Agency’s lead attorney in negotiating the consent decree. “We had to deal with the fact that Honolulu was still having unacceptable amounts of large sewages spills, and we had ongoing and persistent violations of the permits for the discharge from the two major wastewater plants.”
Those violations led to the second major phase of the decree, which requires the city to upgrade its Honouliuli and Sand Island wastewater treatment facilities to meet federal standards.
Handling wastewater at all is an enormous job. In Honolulu, city officials estimate homes and offices produce more than 105 million gallons of wastewater each day. That wastewater is carried from toilets, bathtubs and drains through more than 2,000 miles of pipes and into nine wastewater treatment plants.
“Sewage is filled with all sorts of nasty things, some of it chemical but a lot of it biological pathogens,” said Greig Steward, a microbial biologist in the Oceanography Department at the University of Hawaii. “It鈥檚 full of stuff that can make you sick. Obviously we don鈥檛 want it anywhere where near people can come in contact with it because people do get sick. Sewage also has a lot of nutrients in it, that鈥檚 why poop is good fertilizer. But you get sewage in coastal waters and it can stimulate the growth of plankton.”
When plankton grows too fast, it can suck the majority of the oxygen out of an ocean environment.
“Not many things can tolerate those conditions,” Steward said. “It looks bad, it smells bad, it makes you sick and it degrades the environment.”
Weighing the Costs and Benefits
It was for these reasons that the EPA began requiring secondary wastewater treatment. But since the 1970s, Honolulu has been among coastal cities that qualified for a waiver from secondary treatment because 鈥渕arine (sewage-treatment facilities) usually discharge into deeper waters with large tides and substantial currents, which allow for greater dilution and dispersion than their freshwater counterparts,鈥 the act reads. There are still municipalities that get waivers.
“Most of them are either in Alaska or Maine, and then one major city that鈥檚 out there is San Diego,” said Barroll. “One thing to note is that all of the other wastewater treatment plants in hawaii are secondary wastewater treatment, including the ones that discharge to the ocean. Hilo facilities, Maui, there are no other less than secondary treatment plants in Hawaii, and there are very few around the country.”
Barroll said the EPA has upgraded its water quality standards over the decades, and that as it has done so, the need for secondary treatment has become clear. But Steward said many scientists don’t agree with the EPA’s assessment.
“Part of the problem is the city had a reasonable case to say this is not necessary when you look at the cost-benefit analysis,” Steward said. “It costs so much and that鈥檚 money that could be used to do other things that would have a much greater effect on the environment and people鈥檚 health.”
This is the stance Honolulu officials took since it was first asked to upgrade its systems in the early 1990s, and the city eventually got sued for it.
“I have to agree with the city in arguing and making the case that we don鈥檛 need secondary treatment, and that primary treatment is sufficient,” Steward said. “If you look at where these outfalls (at Honouliuli and Sand Island) are located, Hawaii has natural advantages. We are exposed to open ocean so the sewage dilutes very quickly. That sewage comes out the outfall fairly quickly and it dilutes so much, again very quickly.”
Mayor: A Gun to Our Heads
Mayor Peter Carlisle says it doesn’t matter. As he puts it, the consent decree is “a gun to our heads,” and Honolulu must comply with it in its entirety. But Honolulu has until at least 2035 to meet secondary-treatment requirements.
Some City Council members have suggested that complying with the secondary treatment portion of the agreement is something that may be negotiable again once the time comes. But City Council Chair Nestor Garcia said the time is coming “sooner than you think,” because the city must financially prepare to upgrade those systems. After five years of increased sewage fees 鈥斅爋rdered under former Mayor Mufi Hannemann to upgrade collections systems 鈥斅爄t’s unlikely residents will see any relief.
“Hold onto your wallets,” Garcia said. “It’s likely you’re going to see your sewer fees going up again. It’s been painful. But we’re investing in infrastructure.”
While the EPA said the concern has to do with clean water and pollutants, those who disagree with the need for secondary treatment in Honolulu say it’s about fiscal responsibility.
“With secondary treatment, they don鈥檛 do a chemical treatment that would add anything,” Steward said. “It鈥檚 only a question of added benefit given the incredible additional cost that it takes. A study in 2003 showed that, very quickly, the sewage plume gets diluted down to where it鈥檚 not detected anymore, and the nutrients get diluted so quickly that it doesn鈥檛 even give phytoplankton time to grow.”
In the end, though, Steward said it’s better to do something than nothing, even at this great cost.
“The city saw it was a losing battle, and at some point perception is reality and if the perception is that only stuff that鈥檚 primary treated is a risk, or bad for the environment, then well that is the perception you have to deal with,” Steward said. “It鈥檚 not always the best solution, what makes it into law or makes something a standard. EPA a fairly large government agency, and they鈥檙e not always up to date, they do move slowly. As a general principle, we鈥檙e at least trying to do the right thing.”
