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Farmers throw the dice every year when they plant their fields. Their success depends largely on factors outside of their control – fuel and energy costs, fertilizer prices and, most importantly, the weather. As Rehoboth Beach and Sussex County debate how to deal with treated wastewater, the Delaware Farm Bureau is telling them to help out the agricultural industry.
Rehoboth Beach is sweating under a court order to get its treated wastewater out of the Lewes-Rehoboth Canal by 2014. The city is looking at an ocean outfall system that would pump treated wastewater a mile offshore into the Atlantic Ocean. The other option is to use spray irrigation – a common practice by which highly treated wastewater is sprayed onto crops.
“Spray irrigation of wastewater provides the water needed to grow corn, soybeans and wheat and increase yields,” said Ed Jestice, president of the Delaware Farm Bureau. Land-based application of treated wastewater is a Plan
win-win for farmers, Jestice said. As long as a treatment facility is not on their land, farmers can keep it in farmland preservation programs, said Esposito.
Farmers want to see water recycled and groundwater aquifers recharged, instead of seeing the water lost to the ocean, Jestice said. While the Delaware Farm Bureau is pushing for spray irrigation, the group is not backing any one company to do the job; it just wants to see water reused. “If I was the president of the Georgia or California Farm Bureau, I wouldn’t even consider wasting that water,” he said.
Tidewater Utilities Inc. President Jerry Esposito could not agree more. He recently presented his company’s plan to the Rehoboth Beach-Dewey Beach Chamber of Commerce.
While Esposito stressed above all that sewer rates for all Rehoboth Beach users were going up no matter whether the city chose an ocean outfall or land-based system, he said land application is simply the right thing to do.
“We can reuse this water as an alternative to freshwater irrigation and inorganic fertilizers that can be washed away into the Inland Bays,” Esposito said.
Tidewater, first a water company, has a vested interest in seeing Delaware’s aquifers recharged, said Esposito. He explained that on the land his company plans to lease long-term from area farmers, there are three options for the drinking-water-quality wastewater. It can be sprayed onto grain crops, drip irrigated into the ground or put in rapid infiltration beds – they look like sandboxes flooded with water that drains quickly into the ground where it joins groundwater stores.
Crops such as vegetables often can’t be irrigated with wastewater for marketing reasons – the national corporations that buy vegetables say it can be difficult to sell because of public perception, said D.C. Kuhns, a Realtor who is working with Tidewater and local farmers.
Crop irrigation is still a valuable reuse of the water. Besides waste and nutrients, metals are filtered from the wastewater. There are no state or federal requirements for the removal of prescription drugs or hormones from drinking water, Esposito said, but random samples are sometimes taken.
“Why should we use this water like a paper towel and throw it away?” asked D.C. Kuhns.
Tidewater will pay farmers more for drip irrigation and rapid infiltration beds because it takes away farmable land from them. But, the company also pays farmers to spray the water onto their crops. It pays for equipment and maintenance as well.
That’s good news for farmers because just pumping water, without the start-up cost of buying a pivot irrigation system, can put a major dent in the pocketbook.
Last summer, Jestice spent $40,000 for diesel fuel to irrigate a 500-acre portion of his farm. Because Tidewater pumps to its spray fields, the farmer won’t have to pay to run pumps, Esposito said.
Another perk for farmers is that all necessary equipment, including high-dollar pivot irrigation systems, will be installed at Tidewater’s expense. Jestice said they cost between $1,000 and $1,500 per acre, or $50,000 to irrigate 40 acres. Only a limited number of farmers, whose properties are near treatment facilities, can participate. Still, Jestice says farmers are enthusiastic about the idea. Tidewater is working with some farmers in the Long Neck area to lease land for spray application. However, without a large client such as Rehoboth Beach, the utility will not have a need for extensive tracts of land.
Esposito said Tidewater is expecting Rehoboth Beach to put out a request for proposals for a solution to its wastewater dilemma by 2014. A former Delaware Department of Natural Resources and Environmental Control (DNREC) regulator, Esposito said the city would be cutting it close if it chose an ocean outfall system because the permit process would be lengthy. Conversely, spray irrigation, he said, is a widely accepted technology and can be up and running in three years.
Chris Weeks, chairman of the board of the Rehoboth Beach-Dewey Beach Chamber of Commerce, was also worried that the city make its court deadline. “Suppose they choose an ocean outfall and it isn’t a regular permitting situation? As a business person in the community, I’m concerned that they won’t make 2014, and there will be fines that will trickle down to the end user,” he said.
“I can promise you a permit for land-based application. For ocean outfall, I can’t, because it’s an unpredictable process and these days it is difficult to get a permit to discharge into waterways,” Esposito said.
“Even if we’re not in the game, if the city can get a land-based system, it’s the right thing to do,” Esposito said.
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Workshop for sewer options set for Wednesday, March 19
The state Clean Water Advisory Council is using its March meeting to learn about options available to Rehoboth Beach and Sussex County to dispose of treated wastewater. A Wednesday, March 19 workshop will educate council members and the public on proposed alternatives, which include an ocean outfall system and spray irrigation.
Rehoboth officials went to the council asking for $10.6 million to help fund an ocean outfall project. But the subcommittee wanted more details about the project before issuing a final recommendation. So, subcommittee Chairman Lee Beetschen asked that a workshop be set up in place of the council’s March meeting. Rehoboth was ordered to stop discharging treated wastewater into the Lewes-Rehoboth Canal and ultimately the Inland Bays as part of federal pollution regulations.
Through court proceedings, the city has won a series of delays. But the clock is ticking. Rehoboth must get its effluent out of the canal by December 2014. Based on a 2005 report, consultants decided the best option for the city would be an ocean outfall system. It’s a project the county can join in on, except that the county doesn’t want to foot an extra $10.6 million bill.
So, Rehoboth Beach asked the Department of Natural Resources and Environmental Control’s Clean Water Advisory Council, for funding to bridge the gap. The workshop will be 9:30 a.m. to 12:45 p.m., at the Rehoboth Beach Convention Center.
Based on the information presented at the workshop, the council will decide whether to help fund the project. That decision will be reached at the council’s April 16 meeting.
Contact Leah Hoenen at leah@capegazette.com
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