Sludge Watch ==> Florida - Push to ill advised sludge drying plant

[Maureen Reilly]

Sludgewatch Admin:

Well I guess these Florida types should read the stories from the unhappy 
people who have sludge pellets...the unsaleable, expensive, exploding, 
spontaneous-combusting, food safety problem ....


They need to look at the reports on the costs and problems associated with 
these facilities.
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Got sludge? Here's an idea
Oldsmar wants to solidify a regional partnership and push for a drying 
facility.
By TAMARA EL-KHOURY
Published March 22, 2007


Every day, sludge happens.

In Oldsmar, it happens between 16,000 and 24,000 gallons a week.

But sludge - the byproduct of highly treated wastewater - also happens in 
Dunedin and Tarpon Springs, Clearwater and the rest of Pinellas County.

Now, Oldsmar is hoping all four entities will join its push to create a 
regional biosolids drying facility.

The Oldsmar City Council voted Tuesday to hire Jones Edmunds and Associates, 
an environmental engineering consultant, to study the feasibility of such a 
facility. The council is asking its four partners to chip in $5,000 each for 
the $25,000 study.

Finding an alternative way to dispose of biosolids is a concern for many 
cities as land becomes scarce and environmental standards rise. Oldsmar is 
among those cities that hire contractors to haul their waste to sod farms in 
Manatee, Citrus and Hardee counties.

But even after the solids are biologically broken down and treated with 
lime, the remaining product still contains bacteria and organisms. It can 
only be spread in licensed areas. And those areas are harder to find as sod 
farms are being sold to developers. Also, counties accepting sludge are 
demanding higher environmental standards, according to John Mulvihill, 
Oldsmar's public works director.

The new study comes on the heels of an April study by the same consultant 
that found Oldsmar could process its own biosolids by spending $3.9-million 
to add a heat-drying system to its reclaimed water facility. The system 
would produce a safe, dry, organic and reusable pellet-shaped product that 
can be used as fertilizer.

Tampa, Largo and Pinellas County have their own such biosolid drying 
systems. Pinellas County's system produces about 30 dry tons of biosolids a 
day, which is sold as fertilizer for between $40 to $80 a ton. The proceeds 
are shared between the county and the contractor that runs the system.

The county is interested in discussing a regional facility because of 
increasing demands, said Mike Engelmann, senior engineer for Pinellas County 
Utilities.

"It's a relatively costly idea," Engelmann said of building a regional 
facility, "but there's really nothing that is less costly in the long run."

Dunedin, like Oldsmar, now pays a contractor to haul its sludge. A regional 
facility is a good idea if issues of ownership and finances are agreeable, 
said Kenneth Stidham, Dunedin's director of wastewater.

"Small outfits like Dunedin and Oldsmar and those, we're not big enough to 
pay the 20-million bucks for a facility of our own," Stidham said.

The study approved Tuesday by the Oldsmar council will consider three 
possible locations to build the plant, Mulvihill said. Clearwater, Oldsmar 
and Pinellas County all have some available land adjacent to their 
wastewater facilities, he said.

Mulvihill hopes that construction would start by 2009.

"We'll see where this goes," he said. "I think we'll work out a 
partnership."

Tamara El-Khoury can be reached at 727 445-4181 or tel-khoury at sptimes.com.

[Last modified March 21, 2007, 23:21:38]