'I was wondering why the water looked so clean': CRD's sewage treatment plant up and running

[OnlinePoker]

Victoria and surrounding municipalities are no longer dumping untreated sewage into the ocean — much to the delight of our neighbours south of the border.

Washington state Governor Jay Inslee, who has a house on Bainbridge Island, is among those welcoming news that, after four years of construction, the Capital Regional District’s $775-million Wastewater Treatment Project has begun treating sewage at the McLoughlin Point plant.

“I was wondering why the water looked so clean in front of my house in Bainbridge here,” Inslee quipped in a recorded video call with Premier John Horgan, released by the CRD on Tuesday.

“I don’t live actually on the shore, but I know we’re going to enjoy the fruits of your leadership. I know that you played a role in this as did our predecessors.”

https://www.timescolonist.com/news/local/i-was-wondering-why-the-water-looked-so-clean-crd-s-sewage-treatment-plant-up-and-running-1.24255805

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Our property taxes have gone up a lot to pay for this so I'm hoping it won't have any major hiccups going forward. It was a long time coming but was a necessary project from an environmental standpoint.

[hunter]

1. It's astonishing how many supposedly modern cities don't have modern sewage treatment systems.

Often it is the wealthy people who start buying into a community, raising housing costs for everyone else, who then complain the loudest about the cost of sewage treatment improvements.

It seems like many wealthy people got that way by being nasty and cheap. Some of them merely have a death grip on wealth they inherited, knowing they'll never be as "successful" as those they inherited the money from.

I don't see anything wrong with steeply progressive taxation to pay for things like modern sewage treatment systems.

Very wealthy people get the most benefits of our capitalist society, they should be paying more to support the basic infrastructure of society.

I live in a city that used to dump very lightly treated sewage into the ocean, simply screening out the used condoms and other garbage, oxidizing it a bit, and calling the job done.

These days I can flush my toilet with a pretty pure conscience. Our regional sewage treatment plant produces near-potable quality water that is used for agricultural irrigation and groundwater recharge. The water is drinkable as is, but a low energy reverse osmosis process can make it even better than average tap water, as they do that as a demonstration project within the plant, but there's plenty of demand for irrigation water, so the final finishing stages are superfluous.

In places like Singapore, and wealthier arid oil producing nations, they do recycle sewage back into the water that comes out of the taps. 30% of Singapore's water is recycled sewage, and it is better water than most people in the world have, the U.S.A. included.