The Grim Future for Sewer Sludge in SLO-Co....

Sewer sludge aficionados probably do not exist in this county. Even the operators of the wastewater treatment plants that produce it are probably not that fond of it as it must be trucked out of the County, to Santa Maria or the San Joaquin Valley for disposal.

Of course, our wastewater treatment facility is not built yet, so this is more conceptual than personal to Los Osians at this point.......

At the Board of Supes Tuesday, May 6, 2014:

Hearings:

21. Hearing to consider an ordinance to continue the provisions and restrictions that were in place in the Land Application of Treated Sewage Sludge/Biosolids interim ordinance for a period of four years, and find the ordinance consistent with the previously approved Negative Declaration/Environmental Determination No. ED03-149. All Districts.

The relevant documents can be found here:

http://agenda.slocounty.ca.gov/agenda/sanluisobispo/Proposal.html?select=3289

This is why it is not applied to land here:

http://www.slocountywater.org/site/Water%20Resources/Advisory%20Committee/Submittals/pdf/20121205%20D.Broadwater%20Submittal.pdf

Naturally, the sewage sludge industry feels differently about this!

http://www.sludgenews.org/industry/

The Times Press recorder tells us in an article published on March 25, 2013, 

"The county’s 17 wastewater treatment plants generate 11,500 tons of sewage sludge annually, with the majority of the material  6,100 tons trucked to a composting facility in Santa Maria. 

Some of the material does come back to the county in the form of fertilizer, while the other roughly 50 percent of the 11,500 tons of generated sludge is disposed of in landfills or hauled to the San Joaquin Valley for disposal."

Some day we will be adding our own personal contributions to this amount shown above and those who have not pumped for many, many years will add the most - go Al's!