Editor:
When you find yourself in a hole the first thing to do is stop digging.
The hole here is caused by a faulty applied pollution test EPA used to implement the CWA and the digging deeper is EPA’s resistance to correct this test, which presently ignores all the pollution caused by nitrogenous (urine and protein) waste.
This waste not only exerts an oxygen demand (like fecal waste), but also is a fertilizer for algae.
Furthermore, this incorrect application also makes it impossible to evaluate the real treatment performances and effluent waste loadings of sewage treatment plants, by themselves already enough reasons to correct this test.
This nitrogenous waste contributes to eutrophication, resulting in dead zones and while EPA blames farmers for excessive fertilizer usage and runoffs, it ignores all the fertilizer used to grow food ending up in municipal sewage, where it is not required to be treated.
Let’s get out of this hole and apply the test correctly and when that is done many solutions are not only possible, but also economically feasible OR are we going to blame farmers also for the world’s overpopulation, because they are growing food?
Peter Maier
Stansbury Park, Utah
