Wastewater treatment is a big dirty business – and also a big question mark right now for the Wimberley Valley

“… no matter how much money is spent to reduce controllable regulated sources of pollution, the integrity of water bodies has been severely impaired and will remain so if the fast conveyance, end of pipe treatment paradigm alone continues to be the prevailing model.”

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Update, Wednesday April 29: The city of Wimberley and the GBRA submitted an application to the Texas Water Development Board in January of this year for a $4.385 million grant to construct a "phase 1" wastewater treatment plant – of the traditional sludge collection and conveyance variety – for the city. The service area, we are told, would cover 9 square miles.

The city's application is one of more than 1,300 from around the state now being reviewed by the TWDB under the newly funded American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (federal stimulus package). According to the TWDB, a list of the top-ranked applications and projects will be published by the TWDB in its web site and the Texas Register in early May. Wimberley's may or may not make the first round. Remember that "shovel ready" is an important requirement in order to qualify.

A questionnaire/survey sent to all applicants (which was due April 23) includes 19 questions. Among them are these: "Can you provide executed construction contracts for all aspects of your project requesting ARRA funds before closing your loan or grant?" "Do you have an existing construction contract for your project?" "Does the CWSRF project have Green Infrastructure elements as described in EPA Green Infrastructure?" "Regardless of the population size of your entity, does the CWSRF project meet the criteria for a disadvantaged community?" The RoundUp is hoping the city/GBRA will freely share their responses to these questions with the media and citizens alike. For a look at the entire survey form, click on this link: http://www.twdb.state.tx.us/stimulus/documents/TWDB_ARRA_Survey_questions.pdf

By David Venhuizen

In terms of wastewater management, Wimberley has before it the opportunity to leap into the 21st century. From all indications, however, it appears poised to make an expensive retreat to the 19th century. The leap into the 21st century is about how we should be managing water resources in this whole region, but particularly in the Wimberley Valley.

We need to stop managing wastewater as if it were a nuisance, looking for someplace to make it go “away.” We need to start managing it, right from where it’s generated, as a resource, first and foremost. The water realities are that this “waste” water must become a resource, not a waste.

The retreat into the 19th century – that’s the wastewater plan the City is now working on. A presentation about it posted on the City’s web site – my only source of information, as the City is being very tight-fisted with the actual planning documents – informs that the planners have made a conscious decision to consider one, and only one, infrastructure model for delivering wastewater service. This is a very costly conventional centralized collection system piping wastewater from the entire service area to one large treatment plant. Although water supply is a critical issue in the Wimberley Valley, that presentation offers no plan for beneficial use of the water once it gets to “away” and issues from a treatment plant.

So, you might be asking, what is wrong with that? Isn’t that how cities do wastewater service, pipe it “away” and dump it? Yeah, they have in the past. But, going forward, should Wimberley do it that way, given the current and projected water realities? That is the question the planners appear to be scrupulously avoiding. Well then, what else might they look at?

I was asked to make a presentation to the Wimberley Water & Wastewater Advisory Board about “decentralized wastewater.” I made the presentation on February 23, 2009, laying out a “decentralized concept” strategy and the means and methods for implementing it, with particular emphasis on the circumstances and opportunities in Wimberley.

Cut to its essence, the decentralized concept holds that wastewater is most effectively and efficiently managed by treating it – and beneficially reusing it to the maximum extent attainable as close to where it is generated as practical. The system focuses on managing the water resource rather than on a pipe network to make go “away” what is perceived solely as a nuisance.

The most visible and ubiquitous example of “decentralized” is the individual on-site wastewater system – the so-called “septic” system. In a “decentralized concept” strategy, however, these individual systems would be actively managed and would focus on reusing the water – like in a subsurface drip irrigation system – rather than making it go “away” on each lot.

In any case, an individual system for each home or business is often not the best arrangement, for any number of reasons. It may be more efficient and effective to collectivize treatment and/or reuse to some degree, as determined by the circumstances at hand. Factors to consider may include topography, soil and site conditions, type of development being served – both existing and planned – and indeed the opportunities for beneficial use of this water resource.

The technical details of how the decentralized concept might be executed in Wimberley and the reasons why this may be a more fiscally reasonable, more socially responsible and more environmentally benign strategy get into the minutia. Here and now, it is most important to understand why Wimberley should consider such strategies on a co-equal basis with the conventional centralized strategy.

The third, fourth and fifth paradigms – which way for Wimberley?

I have championed and advocated this decentralized concept strategy for almost 25 years, laying it out for a consistently deaf mainstream. However, it is no longer just forward-looking iconoclasts like me that are paying attention now. Other voices are joining in. Like Paul Brown, president of Camp, Dresser, McKee, one of the largest national engineering firms – a voice from the very heart of the mainstream engineering field.

In Cities of the Future, Brown writes that we are presently in a “fourth paradigm” of water resources management. We’ll skip the full history lesson, and just note that Brown’s “third paradigm” originated in the 19th century. The industrial revolution was in full force, city populations were exploding, the stuff was running in the streets, sewage-borne disease was rampant. This “third paradigm” was all about getting the stuff out of the streets, out of the city, away from the people. Brown calls it a “fast conveyance urban drainage system,” indeed focused solely on making the stuff go “away,” to be discharged without treatment into receiving waters.

The “fourth paradigm” commenced in the mid-20th century, when it was recognized that the waters at “away” were being fouled and treatment prior to discharge was required. Brown writes: “… our fourth paradigm … could also be called the ‘end-of-pipe control’ because the predominant point of control … is where the polluted discharge enters the fast conveyance system or the receiving water body.” Brown then observes about this fourth paradigm that “… no matter how much money is spent to reduce controllable regulated sources of pollution, the integrity of water bodies has been severely impaired and will remain so if the fast conveyance, end of pipe treatment paradigm alone continues to be the prevailing model.” In short, he is saying, this management model is not sustainable.

Indeed, Brown proceeds to introduce sustainability as a necessary goal for water resources management, and then describes the “fifth paradigm,” toward which he asserts society needs to move: “The need for ecological sustainability of watersheds and water resources leads us to a fifth paradigm of water management, a model of sustainable and resilient waters and watersheds. This paradigm adopts a holistic, systems approach to the watershed, rather than a functionally discrete focus on individual components characteristic of earlier models.”

After describing the drivers and benefits of this “fifth paradigm,” including the idea that “all components of water supply, stormwater, and wastewater will be managed in a closed loop,” Brown states, “Closing the water loop may require decentralization of some components of the urban water cycle in contrast to the current highly centralized regional systems employing long distance water and wastewater transfers.”

This shows there is nothing compelling about a centralized wastewater system that makes the stuff go “away,” rather it is largely just a tradition. There is increasing recognition that the way we’ve always done it may not be the way it should be done in the future. Today we face 21st century problems and issues. A system architecture developed to address the problems perceived in 19th century cities may not be the best response to these current realities in a small town, and it is by no means the only possible response, much as those running the planning process in Wimberley may like to assert that it is.

Wimberley is ground zero for the “fifth paradigm." The water resources realities of the Wimberley Valley demand that we get by that 19th century idea that “waste” water management is all about making go “away” what is perceived solely as a nuisance. Rather, we need to recognize from the start that this water is a resource that should be husbanded to the maximum extent practical. As Brown stated, this resource should be addressed by integrating it into a holistic water resources management strategy, not segregating it in a traditional wastewater system.

All concerned should encourage the planners to take another look, to consider the full range of options that are available for formulating a water resources management strategy for Wimberley, to not restrict their studies only to an infrastructure model that is informed by 19th century issues and attitudes. Rather they should move boldly to address the water realities of Wimberley in the 21st century.

David Venhuizen is a professional engineer. A resident of south Austin, Mr. Venhuizen has promoted the use of “innovative” and “alternative” wastewater and stormwater management concepts for over two decades. Besides working in Texas, he has consulted on projects in California, Colorado, Idaho, Massachusetts, Minnesota, Missouri, New Mexico, Pennsylvania, Tennessee, Utah, South Pacific islands, El Salvador, and Mexico. While some of his work has included research aspects, the major focus of Mr. Venhuizen’s efforts has been cost efficient real world implementation of innovative/alternative strategies. He has also conducted seminars on innovative/alternative small-scale wastewater management in Colorado, Massachusetts, Texas, Oklahoma, Wisconsin, and El Salvador.