EPA won't ban use of treated sewage

http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/2004-01-01-epa-sludge_x.htm

I'll try to do better next time.

You and yours are slowly being POISONED!!! Do you believe it yet?

Very descriptive. Time to switch to organic produce.

If your preference is for organically produced food, fine. However, let's keep the hysteria to a minimum about sewage sludge.

Prior to implementation of U.S. EPAs CFR Part 503, regulation of contaminants in sewage sludge essentially didn't exist. Now, fortunately, only those sludge materials that are compliant with 503 may be land applied. Nutrients and metals are closely controlled. The limits imposed by 503 regulations are based on rigorous and solid science, and no one has ever shown that they are not adequate.

The USA Today article in the opening post of this thread was focusing on the fact the even more limitations are being imposed on sludge application.

You can keep eating shit if you want

Do you have some sort of evidence that there is no oversight on the current regulations for contaminants in sewage sludge? Needless to say, it would be impossible for me to "prove" that there is 100% oversight, 100% compliance, and unbending enforcement. My firsthand experience tells me that oversight exists, compliance must be demonstrated, and the mechanism of enforcement is in place.

So, it's up to you to do more than ripping out your hair in hysterics simply because someone told you there might be some dangerous chemicals in sewage sludge sometimes. A little rationality and background research is in order here. I've given you a link directly to EPAs regulations.

It's this kind of nonsense that gives the environmental movement a horrible name.

as you accuse?

And why do you suppose this is? If it's true as you attest?

I suggest it's become environmentalists have been demonized by the right wing.

That's the main BIG FAT reason.

Right wingers also have the KKK, religious fundie nuts, militias, and the like, yet do mainstream right wingers have a "horrible name?"

No, in fact they run things at the moment because they control the media and the language.

I am curious as to why you think the environmental movement has a "horrible name". Are you talking about the Sierra Club? NRDC? Just what?

I spend a lot of time posting on discussion boards with groups that are mixes of conservatives and liberals. It is very hard to defend certain environmental stances when so-called environmentalists are taking hysterical positions based on ignorance, fear and/or opportunism. Examples:

• I'm a member of the Sierra Club, but I recognize that they have played fast and loose with numbers to make a point. They managed to get Kansas's rivers ranked as the most polluted in the entire country back in the 1980s. Kansas??!!! Not exactly famous for dirty water. It was infuriating to those of us trying to make an impact on water quality for states and regions that really are polluted.
  
  
• I seethe each time some idiot points at their thermometer and says, "See? It's hotter today than on this same day last year. Global warming!" It's no different and equally stupid as the counter argument, "Climate change is natural. Ever hear of the Ice Age?" Anyone informed about anthropogenic-induced climate changes recognizes the silliness of both arguments.
  
  
• This thread. There is absolutely no basis for believing that applying sewage sludge to farm land can harm you if that sludge complies with the regulations established by the EPA.

Should we be worried about consuming and accumulating high concentrations of heavy metals, PAHs, PCBs, and other nasty pollutants? Of course, but let's be informed and rational in our approach.

even though a new study attributes it to a high level of soot, mostly in snow, lowering earth's albedo?

I'm not a big fan of ignorance either and don't like to jump to conclusions without evidence.

However, it seems there is massive scientific evidence to support that global warming is a reality.

I believe the stage is set for us to begin seeing and feeling the effects of global warming in the coming decades. I tend to believe the majority of the model predictions which suggest modest changes in temperature during this decade followed by significant changes about 50 years out. Unfortunately, by then it will be difficult to reverse trends. Cutting back in the increases in CO2 emissions is the only reasonable alternative, but I'm not convinced that the current modifications to Kyoto are the best approach.

But you think Kansas rivers are ok because Kansas is "not exactly famous for dirty water." Whatever. Maybe you should examine how farm runoff is handled under the Clean Water legislation. I guess if the place isn't "famous" for pollution, then it's obviously clean. Good logic.

The suite of dominant pollutants -- even pesticides -- changes completely when you enter the domain of urban areas.

I'm glad you're so up on the quality of surface water across the country in the mid 80s. Surely you wouldn't mind answering a quick question about Midwestern rivers: Based on your assumption that farms are the top polluter of rivers, and knowing that atrazine is the number one herbicide used in row crop agriculture, what was the average concentration of atrazine in Kansas rivers? The highest observed concentration? Did the concentrations of atrazine ever result concentrations that exceeded drinking water standards for atrazine? How did the Kansas rivers compare to the rest of the Midwest where, again, atrazine was king? (Word of advice: don't try to b.s. me on this issue -- I personally was measuring pesticide concentrations in Midwestern rivers at that time, including in Kansas.)

If you don't like pesticides, how about good old dissolved organic or perhaps E coli matter from livestock. How did Kansas rate compared to all the other Midwestern states? The United States?

And speaking of the logic of "being famous for pollution," did it ever occur to you that there are rivers that are very famous for being so polluted that the water was sterile? Undrinkable? Flammable? No? How about outbreaks of illness from E. coli -- can you name any famous cases in Kansas? I can't, but I sure can pop off a list from other states.

I contribute every year to the Sierra Club because they are the most powerful environmental lobby on the planet; but, I don't have to like their methods.

it in no way addresses the tremendous emotional appeal this "issue" has. There is no room for solid science based decision-making when we can make sweeping statements like you have seen above and below.

I for one will let my emotions run rampant on this one. I have already fired off three emails to my legislators expressing my disgust that they are letting people put shit in our children's food. I will not rest until shit is out of the food chain...

If you want to ensure you and your family have clean food, join a local CSA farm (Community Supported Agriculture). You will know the land, the farmers, the cows, the chickens, the fruit trees, the vegetables and everything else you eat.

http://www.chiron-communications.com/farms-1.html

In plain terms, a CSA is a community-based organization of consumers and growers. The consumer households live independently, but agree to provide direct, up-front support for the local growers who produce their food. The growers agree to do their best to provide a sufficient quantity and quality of food to meet the needs and expectations of the consumers. In this way the farms and families form a network of mutual support, whether the community be a region, a neighborhood, a church, a school, or something else.

Within the general framework of CSA there is wide latitude for variation, depending on the resources and desires of the participants. No two community farms are entirely alike.

The experiments in farming described in "Farms of Tomorrow Revisited" represent new social and ecological forms of agriculture which have arisen in recent years while traditional family farms have declined and industrial agriculture has increased.

altogether...

with the multiply 'little' agency changes to the Clean Water Act and the treatment standards and manipulation of testing protocols...it won't be long before there's just NO TREATMENT at all of sewage...and all that crap will just be spilled out directly from America's toilets onto the orchards and farm fields, which actually happens today in many places, like Mexico and Egypt....

if bush* gets re-selected again....count on it...it'll be the second thing on bush* 2005 January agenda....right after instituting a DRAFT....

Would you mind providing some documentation for that claim? Banning the treatment of sewage would put is below every developed country on the planet and in worse shape than at least half the third world.

Where do these silly claims come from?

benzene causes leukemia...it took years and big legal actions to get benzene on regulatory lists...now, EPA says it will not consider benzene a 'hazardous waste' anymore...so no more testing for benzene coming into a waste treatment plant...which will result in MORE people dumping their benzene waste into the sewer for free, rather than paying to dispose of it (just like in the old days before EPA (circa 1972)....and that waste comes back to YOU by being applied to farming lands....and there are many other chemicals being exempted, this article cites many and many more already exempted by bush*....there always was very little treatment done to sewage anyways...let the crap settle in a pond...send water back to river, send 'sludge' to a big hole in the ground or out to the farms....but EPA pushed further more expensive treatments to remove toxic chemicals, remove added chlorine, remove metals...and now, each of those 'hazardous materials' is being 'exempted'...and soon...there really will be little reason to treat, because nothing will be "on the list", and therefore, not required to be treated...and we are back to just putting it untreated onto farmlands/holes, and the rivers...like in the old days...it was how sewage worked up to the 70's......industrial chemicals didn't even need to be sent to the sewage treatment plant...just run it out into the river...that's how it was in 1970....

dig through more if you want...it's tedious...exemptions all the time, and rule-making and revisions to rule-making are also stealth-de-regulation, but my post is too-long already...
http://www.epa.gov/epaoswer/osw/new.htm

and the worst is only published on the EPA 'internal' web site, and less and less is posted for public viewing...when you're done that...go back the the main EPA page and go though each program area ...Clean Water, Clean Air, Safe Drinking Water, FIFRA, CERCLA...all of it...and you'll see the same stealth approach of de-regulation....
http://www.epa.gov/

here's an example...but there is a lot of this going on at EPA, ordered directly by bush*...

-snips-

Revision of Wastewater Treatment Exemptions for Hazardous Waste Mixtures (‘‘Headworks Exemptions’’); Proposed Rule - April 8, 2003

The Environmental Protection Agency is proposing in today's notice to add benzene and 2-ethoxyethanol to the list of solvents whose mixtures with wastewater are exempted from the definition of hazardous waste under the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act (RCRA). The Agency studied two other solvents, 1,1,2-trichloroethane and 2-nitropropane, and is not proposing at this time to add them to the current exemption.

Besides adding the two solvents to the exemption, the Agency is proposing to provide flexibility in the way compliance with the rule is determined by adding the option of directly measuring solvent chemical levels at the headworks of the wastewater treatment system to the current requirements. Finally, the Agency also is proposing to make additional listed hazardous wastes (beyond discarded commercial chemical products) eligible for the de minimis exemption, as well as adding non-manufacturing facilities to those that qualify for this exemption if certain conditions are met.

http://www.epa.gov/epaoswer/hazwaste/id/headworks/index.htm

something I have just recently learned not to do.

Buzz Click, you sound like you might actually know what you're talking about on some level, care to share your qualifications?

I'd like to see some discussion on this. Considering I'm a middle-class member of environmental groups with "horrible names"?

I trust the government to do nothing but screw up unless they are watched carefully. I wouldn't trust the government on this issue any more than any other except I have considerable experience with land application of sludge. Believe me, this is one area where the regs are tight, well-developed, and taken very seriously by everyone I've ever encountered in the field.

As far as my qualifications, I am part of the independent group that helped develop the EPA 503 regulations. (I won't be so arrogant to say I was on the front lines of the 503 project, but the big, direct players are colleagues and friends.) We don't agree on everything, but the 503 regs are based on very good research. I also am a consultant for a few companies/municipalities that apply the stuff, and I know firsthand what it takes to get approval to land apply sludge. Enforcement of 503 is left to the states, but the two dozen states that I know well are really hard nosed about it.

I belong to the Sierra Club and a few other lesser-known environmental/ecological groups. I am an avid environmentalist and very pro-active. I tend to have a low tolerance level for those who blast off on a subject with minimal or no knowledge, regardless of their pro- or anti-environmental stance.

I hope that helps.

Please understand that I trust absolutely nothing that comes out of the Bush43-era EPA. I'm really confused by this exemption, not to mention stunned. Benzene was one of the first priority pollutants, and rightfully so. Most (all?) changes in EPA regs are subject to public comment before they work their way through the system and become law. Typical comment periods is 12 months. I'll check this one out. If it's not too late, it needs to be stopped.

That being said, I need to emphasize that an exemption under RCRA is not an automatic green light to dumping carcinogens down the drain. The Clean Water Act and a gazillion other regs prevent the disposal of benzene in such a manner. If if some shady b@stard started dumping benzene in their waste water stream and IF that benzene was not detected by other means and IF it didn't volatilize during treatment, it would not survive in the soil after land application and it would never end up in your food. Not possible.

So, your point is well taken about the exemptions, but it isn't really relevant in the context of this thread.

the links that I gave you....please help stopped any exemption you can...there are many more horrors on the links that you can explore and challenge to the EPA, but many just stay within the Agency and the public doesn't see it at all....I've seen all the tricks in environmental stuff having worked in that area for the past 30 years

as for the Clean Water Act...the exemption specifically applies to that if you read it all...

benzene will NOT be detected by other means because if it's no longer 'on the list' as a 'hazardous material', then NOBODY will run any analyses for benzene because it's not required....that stealth de-regulation, take chemicals "off the lists" so no testing is done...with no testing, nobody will know if it's there or not...then people can throw it down all drains and toilets, because nobody will test it...and that's so much more cheaper than properly disposing of benzene, in fact, it's FREE disposal of benzene...you may or may not be applying benzene to your farmlands if you use sludge...but you won't know...the EPA won't know...nobody will know...

and it's not going to evaporate if you had it on your field right now, because benzene is a SOLID at below 42 degrees Fahrenheit....

benzene very persistently remains in ground water and soils near leaking underground storage tanks, because benzene does not degrade easily in the environment.....


just a note about the beautiful Kansas rivers...especially the Arkansas and the Missouri....anytime that your live DOWNSTREAM from other people...their waste flushes down into your drinking water..for example...Pueblo Colorado has a huge amount of industrial waste and military waste that USED to flow directly into the Arkansas River and downstream through Kansas...BIG waste from the Colorado Fuel and Iron Works steelmill and the Pueblo Army Depot...and other industrial streams....in addition, all the farmlands apply pesticides, herbicides, fungicides...and fertilizers (Nitrate salts...and ammonia, which forms nitrates and nitrites)...and all those farm chemicals flow down into the river...as well as manure from cattle and pigs...and leaking fuel storage tanks, and every city that the river goes through has a sewage treatment plant the treats waste minimally and dumps waste back into the river...when waste is treated with chlorine, the chlorine reacts with organic materials and FORMS new chemicals: formaldehyde, chloroform, trichloracetic acid and others...those are added to the toxins that flow downstream....the absolute polluted part of the Mississippi is the lower sections around New Orleans...a cumulation of the whole river waste from lots of cities dumping into it...the cleanest streams in America are coming down from mountainous areas (amazing that NY and DC get their waters from mountain areas)...and the farther downstream you get, the more toxins accumulate....


lots of these waste streams have been stopped, minimized and cleaned-up in the past 20 years...and that is why the Arkansas is looking better now...I even put my feet in the Missouri River at Kansas City, Missouri just a few months ago...there's a gorgious park that runs along the river at Kansas City and it was a beautiful day....

what the EPA calls....
'spent hydrorefining catalyst' from
petroleum refining operations (K172)

on this link, EPA keeps the REAL name of this waste out of the title and buried deep down in the document....
"polyaromatic hydrocarbon (PAH) contaminated with Vanadium"...

even though the EPA previous referred to ``treatability study'' and
``peer review documents'',
on this link, the EPA corrects that by stating that " there is no ``treatability study'' or ``peer review documents'' "
(which brings up the question: did EPA review and dispose of those documents because they looked bad....allowing the petitioner to produce new better manipulated data...???? or is EPA just not requiring these previously mandated documents??? either way, it's the bush* stealth de-regulation plan in action, and IMO, you'll have Vanadium and polyaromatic hydrocarbons in YOUR drinking water just as soon as this amendment is approved...which it will be when they are no 'documents'.....)

http://www.epa.gov/fedrgstr/EPA-WASTE/2003/November/Day-24/f29319.htm
comment time is very restricted, only a few more days...good luck...keep trying to stop this stuff...
--------------------------------------------------

IMO, the bush* de-regulation is already a giant flood...and nobody can keep up with it....the solution is a new Democratic pResident...

BTW Buz Click...I do believe that land application of waste CAN BE a good thing...IF there is proper testing and a full understanding of the situation, it can be beneficial to all....under shrub*, there is NONE of that, testing and inspections are being stopped, de-funded, or otherwise removed from the process...

you may recall Times Beach, Missouri...when a 'land-application' was made of old oil by spraying it along dirt roads...it wasn't tested...found out much later that it had PCBS, found out because people were getting sick, miscarriages, deformed babies, lots more...that's a real HARD way to find out, testing and regulation is a cheaper and easier way to find out, and more compassionate too...Times Beach, Missouri was destroyed by that PCB land-application contamination...the Government had to buy it out and move everyone....so I also believe in GOOD REGULATION...and testing...which prevents both accidents and deliberate criminal disposals of toxins in land applications...

I must admit I'm amazed by this. Thanks for pointing it out.

I have two close friends in the EPA who can comment on this -- one who works with petroleum waste and the other who works with sewage sludge regulations. I'll find out more and get back.

... but, I probably won't hear from these folks until next week. We'll see what they say.

Why not release this information when more people might be paying attention to the news? Is it because the whole thing stinks and the fewer people that know, the better? I don't trust anything this administration tells us, and I don't think they give a crap about keeping us safe. Money and profit is everything to them and their cohorts. Nothing else matters.

The new-era EPA is a gd joke; the political appointees are simply doing their masters' bidding. However, a lot of the folks in the trenches are serious and dedicated to protecting the environment.

How would the pResident be able to speak in public if they did?

notices...shrub did a lot of that recently, and really truly, nobody noticed...everyone was all busy shopping at walmart during an ORANGE TERROR alert... and busy eating burgers during the start of the 'mad-cow epidemic'...

shrub doesn't speak in PUBLIC anyway, so what does it matter...

For coming to my defense. I live in farm country, and all this crap that is spread on the fields just can't be good. Not to mention anyone who happens to live anywhere near farms that use this stuff, is it really as safe as the EPA claims? I very much doubt it.