By KIMBERLY ACEVEDO
The Natural Resources Defense Council's "Coastal Protection Report Card" ranked Long Beach 12th on its "dirty dozen" list of the worst sewage-treatment plants and other effluent-producing facilities in the Harbor Bight region. On two other NRDC lists, for violations among sewage-treatment plants only and for chemical-discharge violations, the Long Beach plant ranked sixth and 12th, respectively, in the Harbor Bight region.
Long Beach had 71 "excursion" violations, or levels of pollutants that exceed state limits. The excursions included coliform, associated with disease-causing organisms; fecal coliform, associated with human waste; and bio-chemical oxygen demand and suspended solids, both of which deplete oxygen levels in Reynolds Channel water when discharged into the channel, state Department of Environmental Conservation spokesperson Bill Fonda said.
"Limits are put into place to be protective of health and the environment," Fonda said. Long Beach was in violation of DEC limits, he said, from 1997 to 2001.
While the plant hasn't had any recent excursions, Fonda explained, it did have high bio-chemical oxygen excursions in two categories earlier this year. From May to October, the city was in violation with its levels of bio-chemical oxygen quantity and concentrations. And, Fonda said, the removal limits -- the minimum amount of waste that must be removed from sewer water -- exceeded the state limit of 65 percent from June to September.
The city, Fonda went on, has been working to resolve the problems. "We are in communication with the plant and are working on resolutions to the excursions," he said. And the city, he added, has made some improvement.
In December 2001, a consent order was signed by the city and the DEC for a multi-million-dollar plant facility upgrade, according to Fonda. The upgrade will be done in three phases. The city has been filtering and screening waste material, and added a chlorine tank that aids in killing bacteria. The next phase, Fonda said, is the removal of suspended solids, and the final phase will entail removing the sludge and shipping it to a landfill.
"We have been very proactive," Long Beach City Manager Harold Porr III said. "If the NRDC had current information, we would never even be on that list." Three years ago, he added, it was justified, but not in 2002.
The purpose of the NRDC report was to make municipalities aware of their contributions to the pollution of the ecosystem and to help them "take ownership of this region," principal report author Carolyn Summers said. It's especially useful, she said, because the ecosystem isn't limited to county, town, city or village boundaries.
The NRDC is a non-profit environmental group that works to protect natural resources and improve the environment. Its report was based on Environmental Protection Agency permit-compliance data, as well as data from the New York and New Jersey departments of environmental conservation.
