Budget Message / Highlights - Metropolitan Water Reclamation ...

METROPOLITAN WATER RECLAMATION DISTRICT OF GREATER CHICAGO
2009 BUDGET
seeks to upgrade the recreational and aquatic use designations for the Chicago Area Waterways (CAWs) and Lower Des
Plaines River.
If enacted as proposed, the rules would require the District to disinfect the effluent from its Stickney, Calumet and
North Side Water Reclamation Plants (WRPs), and increase the level of dissolved oxygen (DO) in certain segments of
the CAWs. The District’s preliminary estimate of the capital costs associated with disinfection at these three WRPs
range from approximately $963,000,000 to $2,153,000,000. The capital cost of flow augmentation or supplemental
aeration just for the Upper North Shore Channel, the North and South Branches of the Chicago River, and the South
Fork of the South Branch of the Chicago River, that is necessary to comply with the proposed DO standards in these
stretches of the CAWs 90 percent of the time ranges from approximately $204,480,000 to $352,480,000.
The District has initiated a number of water quality studies designed to supplement the rulemaking and ensure that any
rules adopted are scientifically sound, technically feasible, and economically reasonable. The following studies either
have been completed or are on-going:
• Spatial and Temporal Characterization of Fecal Coliform in the CAWs: The District initiated a three-year
study of fecal coliform distribution in the North Shore Channel/North Branch Chicago River (NSC)/(NBCR) and
Little Calumet River/Calumet-Sag Channel Systems in 2004. The study was designed to determine the
concentration of fecal coliform across these CAWs reaches that are typically observed during dry and wet weather
and to determine the change in concentrations that occurs across each reach following wet weather events. The field
sampling was concluded in 2006 and a final report was produced in 2007. The report indicates that imposition of
the effluent fecal coliform standards proposed in the UAA rulemaking will not result in attainment of 400
CFU/100mL in the waterways due to fecal coliform concentrations being much higher than this concentration
upstream of the North Side and Calumet WRPs and in tributary flows, and during wet weather which exerts an
influence on CAWs water quality with respect to bacterial concentration a minimum of 60 percent of the time
throughout the year. This study indicates that effluent disinfection will not provide any significant improvement in
water quality in the CAWs and highlights the need to determine the levels of fecal coliform in the CAWs that are
protective of identified recreational uses. The District has initiated a follow-up study to assess non-point sources of
E. coli in the CAWs in collaboration with the United States Geological Society’s Lake Michigan Ecological
Research Station. This study will continue through 2010.
• USEPA Bacterial Water Quality Criteria Review: In 2004, the District convened a panel of experts to review the
applicability of the USEPA’s 1986 criteria and the draft 2003 guidance for setting bacterial water quality standards
in the CAWs. The expert panel, chaired by Dr. Charles Haas of Drexel University, and including Drs. Joan Rose of
Michigan State University, Herbert Allen of the University of Delaware, and Abdel Al-Shaarawi of Environment
Canada concluded that there are currently no criteria available to derive a science based water quality standard that
is protective of secondary contact type recreational uses such as are occurring on the CAWs. The expert panel
recommended that the District conduct a quantitative microbial risk assessment and/or an epidemiological study of
CAWs recreators to determine the relationship between water quality and risk of illness among recreational users of
the CAWs.
• Quantitative Microbial Risk Assessment for CAWs Recreational Users: In 2005 the District, in partnership
with its consultants GeoSyntec Consultants, Dr. Charles Gerba of the University of Arizona, Clancy Environmental
Consultants, Inc., Hoosier Microbiological Laboratory, Inc., Patterson Environmental Consultants, and Cecil Lue-
Hing and Associates, initiated a quantitative microbial risk assessment for recreational uses identified as occurring
under the IEPA’s UAA on the CAWs. The study consisted of sampling and determining microbiological water
quality during dry and wet weather conditions including effluent, and upstream and downstream of the Stickney,
Calumet, and North Side WRPs and major Combined Sewer Overflow (CSO) pump stations. Analytical parameters
included fecal coliform, E. coli, enterococci, Pseudomonas aeruginosa, Salmonella spp., infectious
Cryptosporidium parvum, viable Giardia lamblia, total culturable viruses, viable adenovirus, and Calicivirus. State
of the art risk modeling was utilized along with use observation data from the UAA Study to simulate the risk to
recreators due to incidental contact and non-contact recreational use of the CAWs. An interim dry weather risk
assessment report was completed in 2006 and the final study report was completed in April 2008. The study
indicates that current recreational practices on the CAWs pose very low risk to recreators below the 10 and 14
illnesses/1000 recreational events, which IEPA has set as an acceptable threshold for incidental and non-contact
recreation in the CAWs UAA Report.
• Epidemiological Study of Incidental Contact and Non-Contact Recreation on the CAWs: The District has
initiated an epidemiological study of CAWs recreators through the University of Illinois at Chicago School of
Public Health. This state of the art study was initiated in 2007 and will validate the results of a recently completed
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