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04-22-2017, 08:05 PM
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#1
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Guru
City: Edgewater, MD
Vessel Name: Catalina Jack
Vessel Model: Defever 44
Join Date: Nov 2011
Posts: 3,585
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Sewage discharges vs. pumping overboard
The following is a quote from a recent article on the Politico website concerning the rehab of St. Louis's sewer system.
"About 50 times a year, after major rainstorms, St. Louis’ sewers overflow, and 13 billion gallons of sewage-contaminated storm water escapes into the Mississippi River and its tributaries. It’s an everyday environmental nightmare and a risk to human health. And it’s a common, if largely undiscussed, urban American affliction."
My goodness,13 billion gallons EVERY year! Now, I don't pump overboard in regulated waters and am not advocating doing so. We boat on the Chesapeake. Can anyone say Baltimore? NDZs? Please.
By the way, Budweiser is brewed with this water. Maybe that explains why it is such a lousy beer. Or maybe it's the rice in the brew.
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04-22-2017, 10:02 PM
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#2
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Guru
City: Tri Cities, WA
Join Date: Nov 2012
Posts: 4,406
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It ain't just an east coast thing. Seattle does it as well as several smaller cities in Eastern WA that I have heard about.
Puget Sound just became a NDZ. I wonder if they'll go after Seattle the next time they dump a bazillion gallons or so into the sound.
__________________
Mike and Tina
1981 Boston Whaler 13'
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04-23-2017, 12:15 AM
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#3
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Senior Member
City: La Conner
Join Date: Jan 2013
Posts: 120
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Seattle is still pumping since the February "malfunction". Of course it's not talked about
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04-23-2017, 05:49 AM
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#4
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Veteran Member
City: Gressvik
Join Date: Apr 2017
Posts: 46
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The Med is another interesting example. A relatively enclosed body of water, it has become the target of draconian regulation by EU authorities. Ships are inspected upon entry and turned away if the sewage system is capable of pumping overboard. Aircraft photograph offenders, who are then fined to the tune of a sizable fraction of the value of their vessel.
All of this makes some sort of twisted sense to the regulatory minded, until you consider that most of the cities on the North African coast run open sewers. Sadly, further discussion on the details of the underlying MARPOL and its RCD hellspawn crosses over into the forbidden sphere of politics, so I'll be quiet now.
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04-23-2017, 07:06 AM
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#5
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Guru
City: Alexandria, VA
Vessel Model: 2000 Wellcraft
Join Date: Sep 2013
Posts: 1,467
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Quote:
Originally Posted by catalinajack
The following is a quote from a recent article on the Politico website concerning the rehab of St. Louis's sewer system.
"About 50 times a year, after major rainstorms, St. Louis’ sewers overflow, and 13 billion gallons of sewage-contaminated storm water escapes into the Mississippi River and its tributaries. It’s an everyday environmental nightmare and a risk to human health. And it’s a common, if largely undiscussed, urban American affliction."
My goodness,13 billion gallons EVERY year! Now, I don't pump overboard in regulated waters and am not advocating doing so. We boat on the Chesapeake. Can anyone say Baltimore? NDZs? Please.
By the way, Budweiser is brewed with this water. Maybe that explains why it is such a lousy beer. Or maybe it's the rice in the brew.
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And, that is replicated, all over the US, every time there is a big rainstorm. Blaming boaters for E. coli levels is like blaming fish peeing for rising ocean levels.
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04-23-2017, 10:35 AM
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#6
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Guru
City: Gulf Shores, Ala.
Vessel Name: Ulysses
Vessel Model: Romsdal 1963
Join Date: May 2013
Posts: 878
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Some of these articles can be deceptive. Trying to put it into perspective is difficult. "Sewage-contaminated storm water". What exactly does that mean ? Is it 100 gallons of raw sewage and 100,000,000 gallons of rain water or half and half ? It does not give you the right information although the sewage treatment plants are required to provide an estimate of the untreated raw sewage possibly released.
Then you have to consider the degree of influence that has on the Miss. R. at that location which typically flows around 2,550,000 gallons per second. I have not done the math but I would guess 13 billion is about an hour or so of flow mixing.
I do agree that this type situation does happen all over the country and world.
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04-23-2017, 10:56 AM
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#7
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Guru
City: Inside Passage Summer/Columbia River Winter
Vessel Name: Alaskan Sea-Duction
Vessel Model: 1988 M/Y Camargue YachtFisher
Join Date: Jul 2012
Posts: 8,046
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So with Puget Sound a NDZ, will any yacht clubs or other environmental group take Seattle to court to enforce the new regulation. Yes regulation, not law.
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04-23-2017, 11:08 AM
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#8
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Guru
City: Gig Harbor
Vessel Name: Kinship
Vessel Model: North Pacific 43
Join Date: May 2015
Posts: 9,046
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I missed any final announcement on the NDZ in Puget Sound. Anyone have a link?
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04-23-2017, 10:46 PM
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#9
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Guru
City: Edmonds, WA
Vessel Name: WESTERLY
Vessel Model: 1974 Pacific Trawler 37
Join Date: Oct 2007
Posts: 502
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04-24-2017, 05:16 AM
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#10
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Guru
Join Date: Oct 2007
Posts: 22,553
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The discharge rules are for politicos to point at , to show how much they "care".
Nothing to do with reality , or polution .
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04-24-2017, 06:13 PM
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#11
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Guru
City: New Orleans
Vessel Name: Panache
Vessel Model: Viking 43 Double Cabin '76
Join Date: Mar 2011
Posts: 1,253
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Spot on, Fred.
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04-25-2017, 09:06 AM
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#12
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Guru
City: LI or Fla
Join Date: Jul 2013
Posts: 1,148
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Sadly the sewerage treatment facilities around the country are in a poor state, like others have stated not much additional funding goes that way as its not a big news story/political advantage.
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04-25-2017, 09:28 AM
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#13
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Guru
City: Gig Harbor
Vessel Name: Kinship
Vessel Model: North Pacific 43
Join Date: May 2015
Posts: 9,046
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Jay N
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Thanks Jay.
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04-25-2017, 09:42 AM
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#14
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Senior Member
City: Rapid City, SD heading back to the PNW
Join Date: Oct 2014
Posts: 212
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As the state of Washington's EPA has stated "there are sufficient Pump-out-stations in Puget Sound", The problem is that a lot of them are not operational.
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04-25-2017, 11:45 AM
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#15
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Senior Member
City: Wherever the boat is
Vessel Name: Kismet
Join Date: Sep 2016
Posts: 458
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Maybe municipalities are an order of magnitude larger a problem but I'm still trying to figure out how the last twenty marinas I've been in don't have a mobile pump out service and yet 90% of liveaboards haven't moved their boat for a year of more.
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04-25-2017, 12:22 PM
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#16
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Guru
City: Edgewater, MD
Vessel Name: Catalina Jack
Vessel Model: Defever 44
Join Date: Nov 2011
Posts: 3,585
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Quote:
Originally Posted by ulysses
Some of these articles can be deceptive. Trying to put it into perspective is difficult. "Sewage-contaminated storm water". What exactly does that mean ? Is it 100 gallons of raw sewage and 100,000,000 gallons of rain water or half and half ? It does not give you the right information although the sewage treatment plants are required to provide an estimate of the untreated raw sewage possibly released.
Then you have to consider the degree of influence that has on the Miss. R. at that location which typically flows around 2,550,000 gallons per second. I have not done the math but I would guess 13 billion is about an hour or so of flow mixing.
I do agree that this type situation does happen all over the country and world.
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Yes, it is not 13 billion gallons of raw sewage. It's just the entire raw sewage discharge for the period of time that the system is overflowing and dumping everything into the river. That's a lot of raw sewage. Yes, the M. River flows a lot of water and I guess you are suggesting that the sewage gets lost in the volume and matters little. That's the point, isn't it? All that sewage year after year yet our do-gooder, feel-good-about-legislation legislators concern themselves about a few boaters. Yes, few, because add up all the boats and I'll bet if all dumped overboard it wouldn't amount to near the pollution that these cities dump on one good rainy day. And never mind the idocy of prohibiting dumping from an Electro-san.
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04-25-2017, 02:08 PM
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#17
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Guru
City: Mississippi
Vessel Name: ADAGIO
Vessel Model: CHB Present 42 Sundeck
Join Date: Jul 2014
Posts: 919
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Have a niece with phd in bio-remediation - her favorite saying: "the solution to pollution is dilution"
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04-25-2017, 04:08 PM
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#18
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Guru
City: Gulf Shores, Ala.
Vessel Name: Ulysses
Vessel Model: Romsdal 1963
Join Date: May 2013
Posts: 878
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Here is part of the situation. Each City and/or municipal sewerage treatment facility is permitted to operate under their individual state regulations and EPA Laws. Most of their problems such as we are discussing are from old infrastructure that is subject to direct inflow and infiltration. Whiting their permitting process most of those city's have a set amount of time to address and correct such I and I problems with the state having somewhat control over the reporting and operations of those facilities. They do not have the same control (yet) on vessels and private craft.
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04-26-2017, 02:16 PM
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#19
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Guru
City: Jacksonville
Vessel Name: Alzero
Vessel Model: Hatteras 63' CPMY
Join Date: Apr 2017
Posts: 1,548
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Consider the alternative: popular anchorages, harbors or marinas would become open sewers of boaters were permitted to dump overboard whenever and wherever. Then again, I may be over-sensitive, because even seeing shampoo and soap bubbles from grey water discharge seems inappropriate to me.
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04-26-2017, 04:15 PM
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#20
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Guru
City: Miami River
Vessel Name: Gotcha
Vessel Model: Grand Banks. Heritage. 54
Join Date: Aug 2016
Posts: 2,988
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Mr W H
Your response makes perfect if your from Kalif. We use Joy and Dawn on the boat to clean dishes and I see no harm in doing so. Many will regulate boating out of existence.
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