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Operators at Raleigh’s E.M. Johnson
Water Treatment Plant are no longer
releasing treated water into an unnamed
stream that flows through Sheffield
Manor subdivision on Raven Ridge Road
and then into Falls Lake.
Subdivision residents called
in the Neuse River Foundation this
winter when the creek turned black, then
green and white. The state Division of
Water Quality tested the growth and
ultimately determined the green fronds
were algae and the white goo was
sulfur-digesting bacteria. Neither is
toxic, Susan Massengale, the DWQ
spokesman, said.
Massengale also requested a
re-sampling of the life in the stream,
which had been done in August 2002 and
August 2005,
The sampling done on Jan. 20
of this year found: “Conditions
downstream of Raleigh’s Johnson WTP have
declined considerably in the past five
months … The remnant aquatic community
found downstream of the plant is less
diverse, much less dense and more
pollution tolerant than the August 2005
sampling below the plant and than
current conditions at an upstream
control site.”
In 2002 the state determined
chlorine from the plant was killing off
the caddis flies, the damsel flies, the
snails, worms, mollusks and other
creatures that inhabit similar streams.
The plant changed its treatment process
to reduce the amount of chlorine.
The stream flows through the
water plant, and Public Utilities
Director Dale Crisp said the only water
going into the plant now is leakage from
a clear well and ground water.
The plant on Falls of the
Neuse Road had been releasing a
year-round average of 4 million gallons
a day of water into the small creek.
Now, Crisp said, “We’re recycling all
the processed water.” It is being piped
into the west raw-water reservoir.
When asked why that was not
done in the past, before the Raleigh
City Council voted on Feb. 7 to require
the recycling, Crisp said the state
Division of Environmental Health, which
oversees municipal water system, had
been reluctant to approve the practice.
“They generally don’t like the practice
at all,” Crisp said. Part of the reason
for concern is that additional chemicals
may get into the water customers drink.
Crisp said DEH agreed once
the utilities department agreed to look
at even more treatment for the water if
there is a problem. To win DEH approval,
Crisp said, the city will increase its
reporting on water quality, sending in
weekly rather than monthly reports.
At the same time the city
council voted to stop the releases into
the stream, it also voted for $3.25
million in water plant upgrades,
including replacing valves, filter media
and pipes and adding pumping capacity.
Crisp said the plant, built in the
mid-1960s does need refurbishing.
Crisp said the ozone
facility, added to the plant about eight
years ago at a cost between $18 and $20
million, has been shut down for the
construction projects. It was designed
to treat finished water and reduce the
need for chemicals, but critics have
said it does not work as designed.
Wake Forest residents have a
stake in the proper operations of the
plant and in releases into Falls Lake
because that plant and lake will provide
all the town’s water in the near future.
Presently the city, which owns the town
water and sewer systems, is operating
the town water plant on the Smith Creek
reservoir and pumping water into a part
of the town system. The city plans to
close down that operation soon. |
