Tarheels Evaluate BS Risks
I know nothing about the BS laws and regulations in North Carolina, but judging from recent Emails from Nancy Holt, a sludge warrior/victim near Burlington, N.C, the Tarheel state is even further behind in this dangerous game than Virginia is.
But on the sunny side, you have one of the top-dog b’crat MD’s taking on the uber-lame regulatory branch, and that can only be good for the citizens and bad for Synagro et al. In 2005 Douglas Campbell, head of the Occupational & Environmental Branch of the state health department sent Kim Colson supervisor of the BS Land Application Unit a copy of the health department’s report “Human Health Risk Evaluation of Land Application of Sewage Sludge/Biosolids” and a list of 5 what I would call extremely conservative recommendations regarding BS land application. Here’s a .pdf..
The recommendations are not bad, as far as they go, and the report has some quite interesting and helpful material in it. But it seems to me to be overly focused on the rate of application of nitrates and testing for them in well water. I think I would have recommended, say, testing the BS before it is spread and testing core samples from sludged land at least twice a year for about 50 different potential toxins, at a minimum.
Unlike Virginia, apparently the NC permit procedures do not require local public hearings before permits are issued. It looks like the local governments have virtually no role in the permits. This appears to me to be a clear violation of federal law — namely 33 USC 1345(e), which says that the determination of how BS is disposed of is “a local determination” — no ifs, ands, or butt-heads, Kim. At any rate, due to Nancy’s effective advocacy, NC is about to hold it’s first public hearing on land application of BS.
I’d love to be there for that one.
