Plant still releasing sewage into bay
Partially treated waste from Hyperion facility violating pollution rules
Millions of gallons of partially treated sewage continues to flow into the Santa Monica Bay from the damaged Hyperion Water Reclamation Plant, the Los Angeles Regional Water Quality Control Board said.
Operations at Hyperion have been disrupted since an unusually high amount of trash and debris flooded the plant July 11, leading to an emergency discharge of an estimated 17 million gallons of raw sewage from a pipeline a mile from shore. Flooding within the plant damaged facilities and equipment, causing even its treated sewage — released daily 200 feet below the surface from a 5-mile-long pipe — to fail
to meet state pollution limits for the last two weeks, according to Renee Purdy, executive officer of the regional board.
Data from Thursday showed the wastewater released from Hyperion is still in violation of those limits, she said. The plant is treating the sewage, but is unable to meet the standards, according to Purdy.
“It is going through all of the steps of the treatment process, but it’s not being treated to the level that it is normally treated because of the damage to the plant,” Purdy said.
Weekly averages show the plant is releasing treated sewage that exceeds limits for two types of solid particulates, water clarity and biological oxygen demand, which at high levels can deplete dissolved oxygen needed by aquatic organisms. Friday, the water quality control board ordered Los Angeles to conduct additional offshore monitoring and to submit daily reports regarding its ongoing discharges. An investigation also is underway to determine the cause of the original spill.
Treatment ‘degraded’
The efficiency of Hyperion’s treatment process has “degraded over time as a result of the plant storing 19 days of solids with nowhere else to go,” according to Elena Stern, a spokeswoman for L.A. Sanitation.
“HWRP placed a centrifuge online for the first time Thursday night and is slowly pumping sludge out of the primary tanks into digesters, which will begin to improve the treatment process and odors,” Stern said. “We have to be careful how we introduce sludge into the digesters and remove gas in order to avoid creating a vacuum in the digesters, which could be catastrophic, which is why partially treated wastewater is being released into the 5-mile outfall.”
Stern stressed that “over 40 years of water quality monitoring has indicated that the 5-mile effluent never ever reaches our beaches.”
The public health department issued new health advisories Thursday for Dockweiler and El Segundo state beaches. But the water board, Stern and public health officials said there isn’t any evidence at this point that the higher bacterial levels at those beaches are a result of the spill or the continued releases from the 5-mile outfall. Testing near the 1-mile and 5-mile discharge points did not show the same bacterial levels seen at the beaches, according to Purdy.
Beaches likely OK
The depth at which the wastewater is released and the ocean’s currents make it unlikely the partially treated sewage poses a risk to the health of beachgoers, Purdy said.
“While I would agree that it is unlikely that the treated wastewater is going to impact the shoreline, the concern we have is the impact to the natural resources and the habitats of the Santa Monica Bay,” Purdy said.
A phytoplankton expert at the Southern California Coast Water Research Project examined water samples and found normal levels for summertime, according to L.A. Sanitation.
“It appears that, based on bacteriological results and phytoplankton analyses, there were no discernible short-term effects on the organisms in the bay,” Stern said in the statement. “For longer term impacts, we are conducting benthic sampling — samples for invertebrate organisms that live in the sediments of the Santa Monica Bay — to determine any adverse impacts to those communities.”
Trawling also will be conducted to assess any impacts to fish and larger invertebrates once the plant is back in compliance, she said.
Normal expected soon
In her statement, Stern touted Hyperion’s 11 years of compliance with its permit limits before the July 11 spill.
“Upon restoration of the plant processes to normal conditions, Hyperion expects to return to its exemplary compliance record with effluent discharge limits in the near future,” she said.
Hyperion went through a similar ordeal in 2015 when a valve malfunctioned, flooding the plant and forcing the release of 30 million gallons of treated wastewater into the ocean at the same 1-mile outfall as the spill earlier this month. Los Angeles paid a $1.31 million fine and had to complete an environmental cleanup.
Concerned they were not getting the full story, El Segundo Mayor Drew Boyles and city staff members arranged a call with state Sen. Ben Allen this week to discuss Hyperion and what oversight the state could provide.
“We know water tests were being done and the water board was all over that and we know the air was being monitored,” Boyles said. “But what we don’t know is what is out at sea.”
Boyles said he had a hunch that elevated levels of bacteria reported Thursday could be related to sewage currently coming out of the Hyperion outfall even though a news release by DPH specifically said “no untreated sewage is being discharged.”
“The city has been working really hard on their relationship with L.A. Sanitation,” Boyles said. “We are working with them to improve upon that. I believe that starts with what’s happening right now.”
Boyles is unsure when the air quality in town will improve as a result of repairs at the plant. Since widespread flooding took place within the plant, foul odors have emanated across town, making some people nauseous.
“It’s anyone’s guess about when this will improve,” Boyles said. “We are hearing end of August.”
In her statement, Stern said the sludge pumping that began Thursday will reduce odors and improve the treatment process.
“Things are moving in the right direction and improvements made will become more apparent in the coming days,” she said.