State Challenged on Plan to Increase Pollution Discharge Into Falls Lake

The City of Raleigh and the Neuse River Foundation (NRF) are formally protesting a recent decision by state regulators to increase the allowable amount of nitrogen discharged into Falls Lake, Raleigh’s main source of drinking water. The move represents the latest battle in an ongoing war over pollution dumped into the lake and the Neuse River system.

The state Division of Water Quality (DWQ) in December modified the Neuse River Compliance Association’s (NRCA) discharge permit by increasing the nitrogen allocation for the Town of Butner from 5,860 pounds by adding 6,113 pounds. The N.C. Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS) manages the Granville County town, which is home to several state institutions.

Comprised of Butner, Raleigh and some 20 other municipalities that discharge wastewater into the Neuse, the NRCA is a voluntary association that helps to control and monitor the releases. The association itself has a federal discharge permit, and its members can release more than their individual permits as long as the total for the association stays within its permit.

The recent Butner permit modification was made without public notice, which the city says violates federal and state law, according to a copy of its petition obtained by Raleigh Eco News.

“The increased nitrogen loading will adversely impact Falls Lake, the drinking water supply for the Petitioner, resulting in the potential for higher costs to Petitioner to treat its drinking water,” Raleigh attorney Dan McLawhorn stated in the document.

DWQ spokesperson Susan Massengale insists the change represents a “minor modification” of the permit and therefore does not require public notice.

“This doesn’t change the amount of nitrogen that gets to the estuary, and that’s what this is all about,” she says.

Last year Butner purchased $1.68 million in nitrogen pollution credits from a sewer utility downstream in Pamlico County. It then asked the state to modify its wastewater permit to allow increased nitrogen discharge into a tributary of Falls Lake in order to boost its sewage plant capacity from 5.5 million to 7.5 million gallons per day.

The controversy over pollution credit trading centers on whether to focus on the total amount of pollution that can be released into the Neuse River system overall, as the DWQ does, or whether local impacts should be considered, which is the view taken by Raleigh and the NRF.

The DWQ last year held two public hearings on Butner’s proposed discharge increase, at which many concerned citizens and local officials protested the dumping of more pollution into Falls Lake. The lake is already showing symptoms of stress, such as algae blooms. The DWQ is currently studying water quality at the lake; for more details on that study, which is expected to be completed in 2007, click here (PDF).

Earlier this year, DHHS Secretary Carmen Hooker Odom withdrew Butner’s formal expansion request, saying the department would await the study’s outcome. But apparently that was after DWQ had already modified Butner’s discharge permit.

Upper Neuse Riverkeeper Dean Naujoks called the DWQ’s move a “backdoor reallocation” of nitrogen pollution.

Butner and the Neuse River Compliance Association "acted in bad faith after stating they would withdraw their request to allow the state to study water quality for Falls Lake over the next 22 months,” says Naujoks. They "tried to sneak the increased pollution allocation into the NR Compliance Association permit, without the ability of the public to comment.”