[Water_news] 4. DWR'S CALIFORNIA WATER NEWS-WATERQUALITY-3/17/09

Department of Water Resources

California Water News

A daily compilation of significant news articles and comment

 

March 17, 2009

 

4. Water Quality-

 

 

Lodi could lose permit to irrigate

Move could force costly upgrade of wastewater plant

Stockton Record – 3/17/09

By Daniel Thigpen

 

LODI - State water quality regulators today will consider striking down the permit that allows Lodi to irrigate crops with recycled wastewater near its Interstate 5 sewage plant, a move officials say could leave the city on the hook for millions in plant upgrades.

 

The State Water Resources Control Board is reviewing the permit after a challenge from environmentalists, who long have worried that Lodi is polluting the groundwater farmers tap for irrigation.

 

Officials maintain the area hasn't been studied enough to conclude the White Slough wastewater treatment plant, and not other operations such as nearby dairies, is responsible for degrading water quality.

 

They say the expense of more plant upgrades would be painful during tough budget times and could threaten at least one large cannery that is the city's biggest producer of industrial waste.

 

Other officials think Lodi's ordeal could have a regional impact.

 

"The Central Valley has thousands of facilities that operate in this manner," said Ken Landau, assistant executive officer of the Central Valley Regional Water Quality Control Board, a separate agency that issued Lodi's permit. "So a significant change in how to go about regulating the site has an effect far beyond the city of Lodi."

But environmentalists who contested the permit say the problems are real.

 

"They polluted groundwater," said Bill Jennings, a Stockton environmentalist whose organization, the California Sportfishing Protection Alliance, appealed Lodi's wastewater discharge permit. "Discharging wastewater is a privilege, and it is only allowable if you do not degrade the environment."

 

The complicated dispute involves three public agencies: Lodi, which treats wastewater generated in the city; the Central Valley Regional Water Quality Board, which oversees Lodi's White Slough plant; and the State Water Resources Control Board, the body considering Lodi's permit on appeal.

 

In September 2007, the regional water board renewed the permit that regulates Lodi's disposal of treated wastewater.

 

Lodi stores much of its treated wastewater in 49 acres of ponds and uses it to irrigate hundreds of acres of feed crops. Industrial waste from some food processors, wineries and manufacturers is piped separately across town and is not treated before it also is applied to crops.

 

Environmentalists fought the permit, in part claiming the regulations don't do enough to protect the underlying groundwater.

 

In a draft order, state regulators argue that the wastewater stored in Lodi's ponds is leaching into the groundwater and that Lodi has not done enough to show it has complied with water quality regulations.

 

If the order is adopted, Lodi might have to make big changes and build expensive plant upgrades, officials said. The city already is expected to finish about $20million worth of overhauls next month that are designed to increase plant capacity and improve treatment.

 

Lodi officials say previous groundwater testing is not conclusive.

 

"We feel strongly that the state board can't make the positive claim that we have impacted groundwater in the area," said Charlie Swimley, Lodi's water services manager.

 

Swimley also said Pacific Coast Producers, a large food processor in Lodi that accounts for most of the city's industrial waste, could be harmed if treatment costs increase.

 

A Pacific Coast Producers spokesman did not return a call seeking comment Monday.#

http://www.recordnet.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20090317/A_NEWS/903170312/-1/A_NEWS14

 

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