Small Town News

Pumping sewage into the ocean? Are you kidding?

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Uh... isn't this 2009? When I first heard of the options the City of Rehoboth Beach was considering for disposing of its wastewater it was a "land irrigation" slam dunk in my mind, so why were people I know and respected leaning the other way? Look at the science, they said.

Now, I consider myself a pretty techno-savvy guy, but the science of wastewater management was low on my reading list; still I was curious. The facts are that what comes out of the state-of-the-art Rehoboth Beach sewage treatment plant is clear water cleansed of any solids or harmful bacteria, not the glop I had imagined. The solids are separated and shipped off in trucks as sludge. So if the water is so damn clean, why can't they continue to put it in the bay?

Well, it's not absolutely pure water; it contains nitrogen and phosphate nutrients. Most of these nutrients have been removed but some remain and they are the issue. So why not spray them on farmland? In many places this is an excellent answer, providing much-needed water and nutrients to crops. Southern Delaware, however, is a rather unique place, a giant sand bar really with an abundance of groundwater close to the surface. There are times when there is so much water in the ground it's a problem. Adding millions of gallons more is not good. The nutrients from the wastewater would make their way into inland waterways, the very issue we're trying to solve.

There is also the huge expense of building a pipeline and pumping the water long distances. But doesn't putting it in the ocean cause problems? Not really; the nutrients are already in the ocean in such abundance that what Rehoboth Beach would add is irrelevant. Fears of poop floating around in the seawater are so off base they're laughable. Bethany Beach and Ocean City, Md. have put their wastewater into the ocean for decades and have not created problems. Even William J. Ullman, professor of marine and geological science at the University of Delaware, who has studied this issue, recommends ocean outfall.

This is why I have revised my gut reaction to ocean outfall and now think it's the way to go. I think if you look at it closely you will come to the same conclusion.





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