Bellingham receives notice its wastewater plant violated air quality standards
Incinerators that burn sewage at Bellingham’s wastewater treatment plant are violating air quality standards, according to a notice from the Northwest Clean Air Agency.
No penalty was issued, but the city must meet emissions limits and standards within a 60-day to 180-day window, according to a violation issued March 27 by the Northwest Clean Air Agency. The agency enforces federal, state and local air quality regulations at stationary sources of air pollution within its jurisdiction.
“The Northwest Clean Air Agency and the city of Bellingham are working together to make sure the plant meets all new standards for its operations and continues meeting air emission standards. This is an ongoing, cooperative process,” air agency spokesman Seth Preston told The Bellingham Herald in an email.
A spokeswoman for the Bellingham Public Works Department told The Herald on Monday that city officials were preparing a statement in response.
City Council members voted unanimously t their meeting Monday night to hire a law firm to help with the situation, and Mayor Kim Lund promised full cooperation.
“Our staff has been working hard to come up with a long-term solution. We take this notice very seriously and we are working hard to understand what it means for us,” Lund said.
Sewage from Bellingham residents and other parts of Whatcom County goes to the city’s Post Point Wastewater Treatment Plant in near the Fairhaven waterfront.
Treated water is pumped into Bellingham Bay and the solid material that’s left is burned in incinerators that were installed in the 1970s.
In 2022, Bellingham considered replacing those incinerators with a process called “anaerobic digestion,” where microbes eat the waste and leave a biodegradable residue.
However, costs for that project soared with post-pandemic supply shortages and inflation and what was first pegged at a $220 million effort became “enormously expensive” with a price tag that could approach $1 billion, Mayor Seth Fleetwood told the City Council in late August 2022. The plan was subsequently scrapped.
This story was originally published April 8, 2024 at 6:10 PM.
