From our favorite Spokane Riverkeeper: This Wednesday you'll have an opportunity to ask questions and give feedback to the Washington Department of Ecology on draft permit updates designed to improve and protect the water quality of the Spokane River and Lake Spokane. The Spokane Riverkeeper asks, how can we improve and protect the Spokane River without limits on PCB's?

The Spokane Riverkeeper is asking that you join us in telling the Washington Department of Ecology that we want to see PCB limits in the final National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System (NPDES) permits that will govern discharges from Spokane's Riverside Park Water Reclamation Facility, Inland Empire Paper, Kaiser Aluminum, and Liberty Lake Sewer and Water District. These NPDES permits will set limits on the amount of pollutants that can be discharged to the river. And as they are drafted now, there are no limits on PCB's.

This all goes down this Wednesday, November 10th, at the Spokane Regional Health District auditorium, 1101 W. College Ave. There will be a public workshop at 6 p.m. to learn more about the permits and ask questions with a formal public hearing to follow at 7 p.m. The purpose of the public hearing is for Ecology to accept formal testimony on the draft permits, which are now in a 45-day public comment period. This 45-day public comment period ends on Wednesday, November 17th at 5 p.m. If you can't make this week's hearing, you can submit your comments to the permit coordinator at stra461@ecy.wa.gov or by mail at 4601 N. Monroe St., Spokane, WA 99205.

Language in the draft permits call for a load reduction of total phosphorus with a goal of increasing dissolved oxygen in the Spokane River and Lake Spokane, as well as limits on ammonia and a group of pollutants called "carbonaceous biochemical oxygen demand". However, nowhere in the permits does it call for limiting the release of toxic PCB's, which Washington law requires Ecology to address. And here's the inconvenient truth for Ecology, their own studies indicate that the City of Spokane's Riverside Park Water Reclamation Facility, Inland Empire Paper, Kaiser Aluminum, and the Liberty Lake Sewer and Water District are all significant sources of PCBs.

PCBs are synthetic, organic chemicals that bioaccumulate in fish and other organisms. Although they are almost insoluble in water, PCBs strongly attach to sediment particles that move readily through sewers and waterways. They are considered to be a probable human carcinogen and are associated with numerous other serious health effects, including effects on the immune, reproductive, nervous and endocrine systems. Although the manufacture of PCBs was banned in 1976, EPA estimates that, nationwide, hundreds of tons of PCBs are still in service in old electricity transformers and other applications.

Moreover, PCBs are highly persistent in the environment and continue to enter the Spokane River and other watersheds. A December 2007 report by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency identified the City of Spokane “as the largest continuing source of PCBs to the river.”

Here's what we know to be true:

Ecology has a draft PCB cleanup plan that indicates that standards for PCBs in the Spokane River are not being met.

The four aforementioned pollution sources contribute to the problem.

Drastic reductions in PCBs are required to meet these standards (more than 90% reduction).

PCBs are contaminating our fish and beaches throughout the river.

Yet there's no PCB limits in the draft NPDES permits? This is why it's important to comment to
Ecology to tell them to stop ignoring this problem, and thus ignoring the health of the Spokane River. The law and common sense require that they address this problem now.

It is critical that PCB limits be included now when major upgrades to wastewater plants are being installed to address phosphorus to ensure that the wise investment of millions of public and private dollars . Former Ecology Director Jay Manning recognized the importance of being up front with the PCB requirements, stating, “I shudder to think of how they will react when we tell them [the permittees] that they now have to engage in whole suite of new activities and expenditures to reduce PCB concentrations.”

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