Pamplona has Nothing on this Bull Run

Here's a nice piece on one of my favorite watersheds:

http://www.oregonlive.com/portland/index.ssf/2010/08/bull_run_watershed_journey_to.html

Earth Overshoot Day 2010: a full month earlier than EOD 2009

Earth Overshoot Day is when we are living beyond our means from an ecological and resource standpoint - and we still have over a quarter of the year to go...

http://www.royte.com/blog/?p=749

Outside the Box - 1

I've gotten a few heads' ups over the last few weeks that I've been turning around in my head (as opposed to getting things posted in cyberspace). One came from a professional venting a spleen about institutional stupidity, another from a resident venting along similar lines, and a third from a newspaper article that seemed remarkably well timed considering the first two events. Also coincidentally, each of these comes from Central Oregon, which makes me wonder what's in the wind. Or perhaps the folks that care about what I say are concentrated there. Dunno.

The first that I'll talk about comes from a citizen that had a conversation about a commercial development in Bend that often suffers from sewage overflows because the development was approved in an area that does not have the sewage line capacity to take what this commercial area doles out. This person asked why the city doesn't require that the commercial development treat its wastewater and reuse it on the landscaping that is required for all commercial developments. This approach has been taken in other places in the country and has the effect of reducing demand on an overloaded collection system and increasing capacity at the treatment plant to serve other areas that perhaps are more easily served.

Here is the City of Bend's response:

The City Engineer said that the City would allow alternate sewage treatment systems for these types of facilities, provided they met DEQ and EPA standards. However, the City would require a hookup to the City's system as a backup in the event of failure of the on-site system. The City does not want to be put into the position of having to take over these systems if they fail -- it would not be an efficient use of resources.

Any alternative system would have to meet standards. The water has to be treated to an appropriate level so that it meets the standards of wherever it will be discharged/applied. There will be solids that will have to be applied in a permitted location.

The City's existing treatment plant currently treats wastewater to a high level, and the solids and liquid are disposed of with minimal environmental impact. One concern the City has is whether any alternative system would meet the same standards as the City's treatment system. However, if the City is satisfied that the alternate system meets applicable standards, the City would cooperate in reviewing and approving the system.

In essence the City requires that the developer of such a system obtain the appropriate permits to operate a wastewater treatment system (perhaps under the same permit system that the city itself operates under) AND pay to hook up to the city system. Firstly, it appears that the city is assuming DEQ/EPA authority in specifying permits and permit requirements, which I would be curious if they in fact have that authority. That would take some more research on my part to figure out. Secondly, the city is requiring a hook up immediately, rather than waiting for a potential problem to manifest itself. This smacks of greed because they want the hook up fee now rather than later. Not surprising from a city that has exhibited similar greed in the past. Thirdly, there is a bald statement that a separate system would not be efficient if the city had to take over its operation. Why would the city ever have to take over operation of a private facility if the DEQ were doing its job? Why is this necessarily inefficient? I, for one, would be interested in seeing a cost-benefit analysis of operating a separate system versus blasting big holes for miles in bed rock to increase collection system capacity.

Stay tuned for part 2...

Another from the realm of "Will we ever learn?"

Stealing this from Aquadoc about a prescient scientist who was a least 35 years ahead of his time, considering how well we're operating now:

Wally's Warming Warning: 'The Climate System Is an Angry Beast, and We Are Poking at It with Sticks'

Time for a shout-out to a remarkable scientist (thanks to columbiawater for alerting me to this).

Thirty-five years ago, on this date in 1975, renowned geoscientist Wallace (Wally) Broecker published a seminal paper in Science titled,"Are We on the Brink of a Pronounced Global Warming?". To say that Broecker was prescient is an understatement.

 Here is the abstract:

If man-made dust is unimportant as a major cause of climatic change, then a strong case can be made that the present cooling trend will, within a decade or so, give way to a pronounced warming induced by carbon dioxide. By analogy with similar events in the past, the natural climatic cooling which, since 1940, has more than compensated for the carbon dioxide effect, will soon bottom out. Once this happens, the exponential rise in the atmospheric carbon dioxide content will tend to become a significant factor and by early in the next century will have driven the mean planetary temperature beyond the limits experienced during the last 1000 years.