It was fucked before this though. The clean ups of the 70’s onwards to 2000 is over, it’s been on a decline since, factory farms dumping shit water, dumping waste on fields, sewage waste, combined with chemical bullshit, on farm fields. There is so much less thought to our health and safety than we think, than used to be the case.
Comment on Ohio EPA weighs allowing data centers to dump wastewater into rivers
buttmasterflex@piefed.social 2 days ago
I have worked in environmental consulting for the past decade and have routinely dealt with Ohio EPA on both hazardous waste investigation/remediation and NPDES permitted discharges. I have been part of teams preparing and submitting antidegradation and NPDES permit renewals, as well as maintaining compliance with existing permits. After reading through the news article and then the actual draft permit, the news article is very sensationalized. I am in no way defending the data centers or operators. The news article correctly states the discharges are untreated but fails to mention the strict monitoring requirements that would in place to maintain antidegradation and conform with Ohio Water Quality Standards and public water supply standards. There is also a Notice of Intent that requires the applicant to meet a list of requirements to even be considered for discharging under the general permit. NPDES permitting is a federal program that is also administered by the states. Ohio EPA is setting some pretty stringent limits under their authority in their draft permit, and the public and news organizations are cherry picking and/or don’t have the background to understand the permit requirements.
hector@lemmy.today 2 days ago
buttmasterflex@piefed.social 2 days ago
TL;DR Yes, but reality is nuanced, as always.
The recent federal bullshit is a definitely the culmination of decades of industry trying to undo environmental regulations. Moving forward, it’s going to take serious efforts and funds to repair and rebuild how much the US EPA and federal sciences were gutted. Some states are actually doing far better. On the environmental side of things, Ohio is actually pretty good. The programs are based on the federal ones and also have more protective limits to some things. Unfortunately, not all states have the resources or programs in place.
To your specific points, treated sewage solids have been spread on ag land for decades. Concentrates animal feeding operations (CAFOs) have been polluting waterways through permit exemptions for decades. A huge issue with land applied sewage solids is PFAS, which is just now publicly coming to light. There are vast deficiencies in the way things have been happening all along that still happened in the “golden era”.
Negligent or intentional releases of hazardous waste onto the surface or into waterways has been greatly curtailed across the board. There are going to to be ups and downs in speed due to the reality of investigation and cleanup work, regulatory review time frames, and the thorough nature of the programs. The “fast” version of a facility cleanup that I’ve been part of, where problems were addressed as they were discovered, still took from 2009 to 2018, then massive reporting efforts that took US EPA 5 years to come back with a final decision.
AA5B@lemmy.world 2 days ago
Environmental work is expensive, and the time frames for cleanup and monitoring can be years to decades to “in perpetuity” for some issues.
My immediate reaction when I read something like this is
- it would be hella cheaper to not let it get that way, yet we keep letting it
- both the purchasing companies and whatever level of government don’t want to get stuck with the bill for someone else’s mess - why isn’t that yet more incentive to not let it get that way?
buttmasterflex@piefed.social 2 days ago
Totally valid. Most of the sites I work on, the contamination happened before regulations were written. Chlorinated solvents are a big problem from metal degreasing, industrial cleaning, etc. Pre-hazardous waste laws, the manufacturer instructions were to pour spent solvents on the ground and let it evaporate. With current knowledge that is clearly not a good thing to do, but the hazards were unknown to the general public. So that stuff happened in the 1950s to early 1970s is still being cleaned up. It would have been ideal for it not to have happened in the first place, but it’s not like companies are doing that anymore (if they are operating appropriately).
SocialMediaRefugee@lemmy.world 1 day ago
Sounds like you worked on RCRA sites
buttmasterflex@piefed.social 1 day ago
Yes, I work on both state and federally administrated RCRA closure and corrective action sites and state administrated CERCLA sites
XLE@piefed.social 2 days ago
I was going to say, especially in this era, “lawful” does not necessarily mean “good,” and can often be far from it.
spacesatan@leminal.space 1 day ago
I don’t know what ‘wastewater’ people were imagining. It’s a datacenter, it’s not like it’s some crazy industrial process with chemical waste. They’re not grinding servers up in a blender and dumping it down the drain.
JustAnotherPodunk@lemmy.world 1 day ago
I think it’s the overall consensus that no normal person wants the data centers in the first place, and we want any justification possible to stop them. It’s not the actua reality that’s the issue. Cool water goes through pipes. Warmer water goes out back into the river. Sure. There’s a whole list of potential issues depending on the execution, but they can be properly and legally mitigated. It’s public sentiment that is the real issue. And I agree with that sentiment.
SlurpingPus@lemmy.world 1 day ago
As someone using a web app right this moment and also making websites at other times, I do want datacenters.
buttmasterflex@piefed.social 1 day ago
I agree with the sentiment as well. The unfortunate part of this is people pointing fingers at Ohio EPA when the agency can only act within their legal authority. Ohio EPA cannot grant or deny a business’s ability to operate up front like that. In this scenario they can only set limits for contaminants and enforce them. If bad actors violate those limits, then they can issue violations, assess fines, and refer cases to the AG for criminal prosecution. In extreme cases they can force a company to stop operating until violations are resolved.
chaogomu@lemmy.world 2 days ago
What it sounds like is the data centers are using untreated river water, and then are wanting to put that untreated (and now hot) water back.
This is better than using municipal water, which goes through expensive treatment to make it safe to drink.
RandAlThor@lemmy.ca 2 days ago
I would hope they would have a reservoir to cool the hot water before dumping it back into a river. I can’t imagine hot water being healthy for life in the river.
billwashere@lemmy.world 2 days ago
It’s called thermal pollution and no it isn’t.
pHr34kY@lemmy.world 2 days ago
You’d think that once the water is cooled, you could send it through again.
buttmasterflex@piefed.social 2 days ago
Yes. there are stipulations in the draft water about maximum withdrawal from surface water sources and required continuous monitoring of water temperature of the discharges.