- Frank Stanford's comment
- Making the best of a bad situation- New group to tackle sewage options
LETTERS:
- Sewage confusion continues to churn (Langley)
- Getting the best system for the cost (Regier)
=============
Frank Stanford's comment
- Getting the best system for the cost (Regier)
=============
Frank Stanford's comment
CFAX 1070
Fri Jan 9, '15
Wish I could tell you that 2015 started off with a whole new spirit of co-operation and "git r dun" gusto at this week's first meeting of the new Core Area Liquid Waste Management Committee...more easily described as the CRD sewage committee.
But a couple of things suggest otherwise.
One was the confirmation reported to the Committee that the contractor who's bid to build a plant on McLoughlin Point was accepted in last year's competitive process, has agreed to extend his price guarantee to March 31st. Just in case there's an about face and the McLoughlin Point plan is suddenly back in play.
Barb Desjardins made little effort to hide her displeasure at that bit of news...not using these exact words, but muttering something akin to "what part of 'this deal is dead' do you not understand?"
Course the other big revelation in the orientation lecture prepared for the benefit of new committee members, is that the geography of the thing is nowhere near as simple as we might have thought.
There's already a "Westside committee" and now there's going to be an "Eastside committee" and wouldn't it be wonderful if we end up with two projects that don't rely on one another ...if the two sides of the region don't get along maybe they can co-exist. But the reality is that the single largest flow of sewage comes from the west side of Saanich, through a pipe called the northWEST main, down through Esquimalt and into the ocean via MacAuley Point. That's reality. But politically Saanich will be part of the "Eastside" committee, that will be formally created by a Board resolution next week.
Either the region's right hand and left hand are going to have to learn how to get along and play nice, or Saanich is going to have to build a very expensive cross town sewer pipe.
There is little room for optimism that this will all be sorted out anytime soon.
This is Frank Stanford
http://www.cfax1070.com/Shows/
Wish I could tell you that 2015 started off with a whole new spirit of co-operation and "git r dun" gusto at this week's first meeting of the new Core Area Liquid Waste Management Committee...more easily described as the CRD sewage committee.
But a couple of things suggest otherwise.
One was the confirmation reported to the Committee that the contractor who's bid to build a plant on McLoughlin Point was accepted in last year's competitive process, has agreed to extend his price guarantee to March 31st. Just in case there's an about face and the McLoughlin Point plan is suddenly back in play.
Barb Desjardins made little effort to hide her displeasure at that bit of news...not using these exact words, but muttering something akin to "what part of 'this deal is dead' do you not understand?"
Course the other big revelation in the orientation lecture prepared for the benefit of new committee members, is that the geography of the thing is nowhere near as simple as we might have thought.
There's already a "Westside committee" and now there's going to be an "Eastside committee" and wouldn't it be wonderful if we end up with two projects that don't rely on one another ...if the two sides of the region don't get along maybe they can co-exist. But the reality is that the single largest flow of sewage comes from the west side of Saanich, through a pipe called the northWEST main, down through Esquimalt and into the ocean via MacAuley Point. That's reality. But politically Saanich will be part of the "Eastside" committee, that will be formally created by a Board resolution next week.
Either the region's right hand and left hand are going to have to learn how to get along and play nice, or Saanich is going to have to build a very expensive cross town sewer pipe.
There is little room for optimism that this will all be sorted out anytime soon.
This is Frank Stanford
http://www.cfax1070.com/Shows/
---------------
Making the best of a bad situation
Editorial, Oak Bay News
Jan 13, 2015
It’s likely not the ideal solution, but the three eastern CRD municipalities are on their way to making the best of a bad situation.
The municipalities of Oak Bay, Victoria and Saanich have initiated discussions to identify wastewater treatment options for their communities as part of a comprehensive regional solution. The Capital Regional District is expected to give formal approval this week for a Wastewater and Resource Recovery Select Committee for the three communities.
In a perfect world all the Greater Victoria municipalities would work together to find a solution to the sewage treatment issue. But the intransigence shown by Esquimalt Mayor Barbara Desjardins make the prospects of finding a perfect solution seem all but impossible.
And the local civic officials simply don’t have the luxury of waiting for a dream scenario to materialize for the region or other municipalities to have a change of heart.
The CRD is required by federal legislation to treat its sewage to a secondary or greater level by 2020, and the province has set a sewage treatment deadline of 2018. Last spring the project to develop a regional wastewater treatment facility at McLoughlin Point came to a grinding halt after Esquimalt denied required rezoning. Work was meant to begin by the end of July 2014 on the projected $788-million plant.
Meetings will be held in the three communities as the committee works to identify a location for the facility and hammer down the costs. There will be some help on that front as the province has committed $248 million, while the federal government has offered $253.4 million towards the final project cost contingent on meeting specific timelines. That money will now likely have to be split with the solution identified by the western communities of Colwood, Esquimalt, Langford, View Royal, and the Songhees Nation.
No matter what the final break down of costs works out to be, what is clear is that time is of the essence in order to prevent $500 million from being flushed down the drain.
http://www.bclocalnews.com/
Editorial, Oak Bay News
Jan 13, 2015
It’s likely not the ideal solution, but the three eastern CRD municipalities are on their way to making the best of a bad situation.
The municipalities of Oak Bay, Victoria and Saanich have initiated discussions to identify wastewater treatment options for their communities as part of a comprehensive regional solution. The Capital Regional District is expected to give formal approval this week for a Wastewater and Resource Recovery Select Committee for the three communities.
In a perfect world all the Greater Victoria municipalities would work together to find a solution to the sewage treatment issue. But the intransigence shown by Esquimalt Mayor Barbara Desjardins make the prospects of finding a perfect solution seem all but impossible.
And the local civic officials simply don’t have the luxury of waiting for a dream scenario to materialize for the region or other municipalities to have a change of heart.
The CRD is required by federal legislation to treat its sewage to a secondary or greater level by 2020, and the province has set a sewage treatment deadline of 2018. Last spring the project to develop a regional wastewater treatment facility at McLoughlin Point came to a grinding halt after Esquimalt denied required rezoning. Work was meant to begin by the end of July 2014 on the projected $788-million plant.
Meetings will be held in the three communities as the committee works to identify a location for the facility and hammer down the costs. There will be some help on that front as the province has committed $248 million, while the federal government has offered $253.4 million towards the final project cost contingent on meeting specific timelines. That money will now likely have to be split with the solution identified by the western communities of Colwood, Esquimalt, Langford, View Royal, and the Songhees Nation.
No matter what the final break down of costs works out to be, what is clear is that time is of the essence in order to prevent $500 million from being flushed down the drain.
http://www.bclocalnews.com/
------------
New group to tackle sewage options
Christine van Reeuwyk
Oak Bay News
Jan 13, 2015 at 4:00 PM
The Capital Regional District is expected to make it official – a working group of the three east side municipalities to scope out waste water treatment options for Saanich, Oak Bay and Victoria.
The CRD board is expected to approve a Wastewater and Resource Recovery Select Committee that would formalize discussions already underway between the municipalities of Saanich, Victoria and Oak Bay to identify wastewater treatment options as part of a comprehensive regional solution.
“The first thing we need to do is our due diligence – best practices sounding, where you take two, three months to simply get an independent group who have an unimpeachable reputation to show us the best of what’s available for sewage treatment and resource recovery,” said Coun. Vic Derman, who sits on the CRD’s waste water management committee.
Nils Jensen, Oak Bay Mayor and CRD chair, said the working group would look very much like the one created last November by Colwood, Esquimalt, Langford, View Royal, and Songhees Nation.
“There will be meetings in the three communities. There won’t be a lot of duplication, we’ll be sharing a lot of information,” Jensen said. “It allows us to work together and reach out to residents. There will be a lot of options on the table.”
The committee would be supported by the CRD and municipal staff to develop and evaluate sub-regional treatment options for their communities, conduct costing exercises and work with other municipalities to optimize existing conveyance infrastructure.
A series of open houses and an online survey is currently underway to gauge resident input as well, Jensen said.
“It’s a matter of balancing the three issues, environmental, economic and social, and what are the relative impacts,” Jensen said. “Until we get the costing of each of the options it’s going to be difficult for people to provide a meaningful opinion.”
Derman has been attempting to get the CRD board to look at alternative treatment technology and applications for the better part of seven years. He said last week’s motion to explore those options was a long time coming.
“We really need to get people the best environmental benefit and financial bang for your buck. So we need to look at waste streams. If we do things properly, there are some really exciting prospects,” Derman said.
Derman envisions a waste plant that receives not only sewage, but kitchen scraps and other garbage now destined for the Hartland landfill.
“We have the potential to cause transformative change in the region. If it doesn’t, you’ve done your homework. If the answer is positive, you could be making remarkable changes,” Derman said.
The CRD is required by federal legislation to treat its sewage to a secondary or greater level by 2020, and the province has set a sewage treatment deadline of 2018. Some directors are pushing for an extension of the provincial deadline to 2020 as well.
Last spring, the project to develop a regional wastewater treatment facility at McLoughlin Point came to a grinding halt after Esquimalt denied required rezoning and the province declined to intervene. Work was meant to begin by the end of July 2014 on the projected $788-million plant.
In August, Oak Bay council asked staff to begin discussions with the municipality of Saanich and City of Victoria to collectively come up with a “Plan B.” In early October CRD directors approved a new framework to gauge the value of subset wastewater treatment options.
The province has committed $248 million, while the federal government has offered $253.4 million towards the final project cost contingent on meeting specific timelines. Additional costs are the CRD’s responsibility.
Visit the CRD website at crd.bc.ca/project/wastewater-
http://www.oakbaynews.com/
Jan 13, 2015 at 4:00 PM
The Capital Regional District is expected to make it official – a working group of the three east side municipalities to scope out waste water treatment options for Saanich, Oak Bay and Victoria.
The CRD board is expected to approve a Wastewater and Resource Recovery Select Committee that would formalize discussions already underway between the municipalities of Saanich, Victoria and Oak Bay to identify wastewater treatment options as part of a comprehensive regional solution.
“The first thing we need to do is our due diligence – best practices sounding, where you take two, three months to simply get an independent group who have an unimpeachable reputation to show us the best of what’s available for sewage treatment and resource recovery,” said Coun. Vic Derman, who sits on the CRD’s waste water management committee.
Nils Jensen, Oak Bay Mayor and CRD chair, said the working group would look very much like the one created last November by Colwood, Esquimalt, Langford, View Royal, and Songhees Nation.
“There will be meetings in the three communities. There won’t be a lot of duplication, we’ll be sharing a lot of information,” Jensen said. “It allows us to work together and reach out to residents. There will be a lot of options on the table.”
The committee would be supported by the CRD and municipal staff to develop and evaluate sub-regional treatment options for their communities, conduct costing exercises and work with other municipalities to optimize existing conveyance infrastructure.
A series of open houses and an online survey is currently underway to gauge resident input as well, Jensen said.
“It’s a matter of balancing the three issues, environmental, economic and social, and what are the relative impacts,” Jensen said. “Until we get the costing of each of the options it’s going to be difficult for people to provide a meaningful opinion.”
Derman has been attempting to get the CRD board to look at alternative treatment technology and applications for the better part of seven years. He said last week’s motion to explore those options was a long time coming.
“We really need to get people the best environmental benefit and financial bang for your buck. So we need to look at waste streams. If we do things properly, there are some really exciting prospects,” Derman said.
Derman envisions a waste plant that receives not only sewage, but kitchen scraps and other garbage now destined for the Hartland landfill.
“We have the potential to cause transformative change in the region. If it doesn’t, you’ve done your homework. If the answer is positive, you could be making remarkable changes,” Derman said.
The CRD is required by federal legislation to treat its sewage to a secondary or greater level by 2020, and the province has set a sewage treatment deadline of 2018. Some directors are pushing for an extension of the provincial deadline to 2020 as well.
Last spring, the project to develop a regional wastewater treatment facility at McLoughlin Point came to a grinding halt after Esquimalt denied required rezoning and the province declined to intervene. Work was meant to begin by the end of July 2014 on the projected $788-million plant.
In August, Oak Bay council asked staff to begin discussions with the municipality of Saanich and City of Victoria to collectively come up with a “Plan B.” In early October CRD directors approved a new framework to gauge the value of subset wastewater treatment options.
The province has committed $248 million, while the federal government has offered $253.4 million towards the final project cost contingent on meeting specific timelines. Additional costs are the CRD’s responsibility.
Visit the CRD website at crd.bc.ca/project/wastewater-
http://www.oakbaynews.com/
=============
LETTERS:
Sewage confusion continues to churn (Langley)TIMES COLONIST
JANUARY 11, 2015
Re: “Panel to consider sewage options,” Jan. 8.
The Capital Regional District has given responsibilities to a “west-side” committee (Colwood, Langford, View Royal and Esquimalt) and an “east-side” committee (Victoria, Saanich and Oak Bay) to assess local sewage-treatment options and report by March 2015 on the best treatment scheme for each of those areas.
On Jan. 7, the CRD sewage-treatment committee approved a motion for “CRD staff to report back to committee on implementing a process for market sounding and other possible measures for investigating technology and best practices for liquid waste management.” How long will it take to get useful information from this initiative?
The plan seems to be for the CRD to obtain and provide, several months up the road, well-based new technical and cost guidance on sewage treatment to the west and east working committees. However, this will come after those committees have made their local decisions on the best systems for their areas.
Chaos and confusion on regional sewage treatment is guaranteed through 2015.
David Langley
Saanich
http://www.timescolonist.com/
JANUARY 11, 2015
Re: “Panel to consider sewage options,” Jan. 8.
The Capital Regional District has given responsibilities to a “west-side” committee (Colwood, Langford, View Royal and Esquimalt) and an “east-side” committee (Victoria, Saanich and Oak Bay) to assess local sewage-treatment options and report by March 2015 on the best treatment scheme for each of those areas.
On Jan. 7, the CRD sewage-treatment committee approved a motion for “CRD staff to report back to committee on implementing a process for market sounding and other possible measures for investigating technology and best practices for liquid waste management.” How long will it take to get useful information from this initiative?
The plan seems to be for the CRD to obtain and provide, several months up the road, well-based new technical and cost guidance on sewage treatment to the west and east working committees. However, this will come after those committees have made their local decisions on the best systems for their areas.
Chaos and confusion on regional sewage treatment is guaranteed through 2015.
David Langley
Saanich
http://www.timescolonist.com/
-------------
Getting the best system for the cost (Regier)
Oak Bay News
Oak Bay News
Jan 13, 2015
Re: Region in need of sewage solution.
Space limitations in letters to the editor do indeed make it difficult to present comprehensive details on complex issues like the sewage treatment project, but Mr. Hull’s response characterizing the comments and issues raised in Dr. Maler’s letter and my previous letter as “misinformed swill” serves only to further illustrate the closed-box approach that culminated in the failed McLoughlin Point proposal.
Continuing with the theme of half-truths, he chooses not to mention the other benefits of using membrane technology to provide tertiary treatment, for example, several new, long, deep ocean outfalls not required; unnecessary sewage and sludge conveyance pipelines and pump stations eliminated; discharges to the sea of contaminants of emerging concern curtailed.
In his view, the strategy is simply to substitute one type of plant for another while failing to see there are other objectives and viable system alternatives that can achieve better results for less than the outdated estimate referred to.
The issue of water reuse should indeed keep coming up because water is one of our most precious resources and therefore critical to the actions we take regarding climate change, habitat protection and local food security. I am well aware of the limitations on installing purple pipe distribution systems, retrofitting toilet supply plumbing or irrigating water-logged turf during the winter rains. But these are just diversions from the critical issue he fails to mention: should reuse of reclaimed water be implemented for these or other beneficial uses, there would be a significant reduction in consumption of CRD’s potable water, hence a significant reduction in CRD’s revenue that would have to be offset by much more substantial increases in utility billings than we have already experienced. There are other uses for reclaimed water that would have limited impacts on potable water consumption but Mr. Hull has not bothered to mention them.
Mr. Hull has finally dared to ask the question that should have been asked long ago, and one that the residents could have answered then had they been provided with all the relevant details. “How much more is the public willing to pay for a distributed, tertiary treatment system with a limited improvement in effluent quality?” My answer: not as much as one with more significant improvements in effluent quality that also recycles the water for beneficial uses.
But yes, let’s wait for full disclosure of the professional’s detailed cost estimates (hoping that this time these will not be redacted) and for proper full lifecycle cost analyses – for the projects brought forward by an informed, engaged public – not one imposed by the CRD.
Oscar Regier
Victoria
http://www.oakbaynews.com/
Re: Region in need of sewage solution.
Space limitations in letters to the editor do indeed make it difficult to present comprehensive details on complex issues like the sewage treatment project, but Mr. Hull’s response characterizing the comments and issues raised in Dr. Maler’s letter and my previous letter as “misinformed swill” serves only to further illustrate the closed-box approach that culminated in the failed McLoughlin Point proposal.
Continuing with the theme of half-truths, he chooses not to mention the other benefits of using membrane technology to provide tertiary treatment, for example, several new, long, deep ocean outfalls not required; unnecessary sewage and sludge conveyance pipelines and pump stations eliminated; discharges to the sea of contaminants of emerging concern curtailed.
In his view, the strategy is simply to substitute one type of plant for another while failing to see there are other objectives and viable system alternatives that can achieve better results for less than the outdated estimate referred to.
The issue of water reuse should indeed keep coming up because water is one of our most precious resources and therefore critical to the actions we take regarding climate change, habitat protection and local food security. I am well aware of the limitations on installing purple pipe distribution systems, retrofitting toilet supply plumbing or irrigating water-logged turf during the winter rains. But these are just diversions from the critical issue he fails to mention: should reuse of reclaimed water be implemented for these or other beneficial uses, there would be a significant reduction in consumption of CRD’s potable water, hence a significant reduction in CRD’s revenue that would have to be offset by much more substantial increases in utility billings than we have already experienced. There are other uses for reclaimed water that would have limited impacts on potable water consumption but Mr. Hull has not bothered to mention them.
Mr. Hull has finally dared to ask the question that should have been asked long ago, and one that the residents could have answered then had they been provided with all the relevant details. “How much more is the public willing to pay for a distributed, tertiary treatment system with a limited improvement in effluent quality?” My answer: not as much as one with more significant improvements in effluent quality that also recycles the water for beneficial uses.
But yes, let’s wait for full disclosure of the professional’s detailed cost estimates (hoping that this time these will not be redacted) and for proper full lifecycle cost analyses – for the projects brought forward by an informed, engaged public – not one imposed by the CRD.
Oscar Regier
Victoria
http://www.oakbaynews.com/
