News

Schumer's pipe dream

Ocean outfall would dump Bay Park sewage plant's effluent 3 miles from shore

Posted

If U.S. Sen. Charles Schumer has his way, hundreds of millions of dollars in additional federal aid coming to New York would be used to fund a new ocean outfall pipe for East Rockaway’s Bay Park Sewage Treatment Plant, which would redirect the plant’s effluent from Reynolds Channel to three miles out into the Atlantic.
At a press conference on the Long Beach fishing pier on Reynolds Channel on Monday morning, with the pipe’s existing cement outlet visible in the background, Schumer and Nassau County Executive Ed Mangano called on Gov. Andrew Cuomo and the state government to allocate money from three new federal aid sources for a pipe.
“The ocean outfall pipe is the final piece of the Bay Park puzzle,” Schumer said, alluding to more than $1 billion in FEMA aid that has already been used to rebuild the plant, which was heavily damaged in Hurricane Sandy.
The reconstruction began in 2013, and $150 million was allocated to upgrade the plant’s nitrogen-removal system. The funding could not be used to build an outfall pipe, however, because, according to FEMA regulations, its use is restricted to repairing equipment that was damaged in the storm.
According to Schumer, however, without a new pipe in place, all of that work may be for naught, because, as of now, the waters of Reynolds Channel don’t measure up to Environmental Protection Agency standards, and will not do so without help from an outfall pipe.

Why an outfall pipe?
If Bay Park’s effluent, whose high levels of nitrogen threaten aquatic plant and animal life in the channel, were directed into the ocean instead, environmental experts contend, the wastewater would dissolve in the ocean’s constantly moving water rather than remaining in the slower-moving waters of the channel.
That reduction in pollution, Schumer said, would have numerous benefits for area residents. It would revitalize commercial fishing and recreational boating, entice swimmers back into Reynolds Channel and restore aquatic plant life, which, among other benefits, would help prevent floodwaters from future storms from destroying the plant and nearby homes.

Page 1 / 3