Feb. 16, 2002 — A proposal to treat St. Croix's wastewater using constructed wetlands rather than building a sewage treatment plant received a positive reception at a Senate hearing in Frederiksted on Friday.
St. Croix-based Carib Infra-Tech, headed by Onaje Jackson, wants the Public Works Department to consider the alternative treatment method, which entails pumping 1 million to 3 million gallons per day of discharge from the Public Works wastewater treatment plant next to the Anguilla dump to constructed wetlands in the mid-island area of St. Croix. This would eliminate the discharge of marginally treated sewage into the ocean and allow for the wastewater to be reclaimed for a variety of uses.
The reclaimed water from the St. Croix sewage system would be used to irrigate the Carambola Golf Course and crops and recharge the island's aquifer, Jackson told members of the Senate Planning and Environmental Protection Committee.
The proposal also could help Public Works meet U.S. Environmental Protection Agency requirements that the territory treat its wastewater discharges into the sea at a higher level than it currently does. Public Works will likely have to renovate the Anguilla wastewater plant to meet EPA standards, since the agency has denied a Public Works application for a waiver from having to treat sewage at a secondary level.
Public Works currently is unable to manage discharges from its wastewater treatment plant at the primary level, which means removing solids from liquid before discharging into the ocean. Secondary treatment entails higher — and more expensive — standards. The department has just over a year in which to develop a compliance plan detailing how it would attain secondary treatment. The cost of retrofitting several of the territory’s old treatment plants, including the one on St. Croix, has been estimated at $20 million.
Jackson said it would cost about $16 million to build the constructed wetlands and about $300,000 a year to operate and maintain them.
According to the EPA's Office of Water web site, constructed wetlands treatment systems are engineered systems that have been designed and constructed to utilize the natural processes involving wetland vegetation, soils and their "associated microbial assemblages" to assist in treating wastewater. The wetlands are designed to take advantage of many of the same processes that occur in natural wetlands, but do so within a more controlled environment.
A total of 17 such systems in 10 states have been designed and are being operated for the sole purpose of treating wastewater. Others have been implemented for multiple uses, such as using treated wastewater effluent as a water source for the creation and restoration of wetlands habitat for wildlife and to enhance the environment.
While senators expressed encouragement for the proposal at Friday's hearing, no Public Works officials or other representatives of the Turnbull administration were present.
