Tidewater Environmental Services applies for Coastal Zone Act permit

The Department of Natural Resources and Environmental Control has received an application for a Coastal Zone Act permit from Tidewater Environmental Services Inc. of Dover to construct and operate a regional wastewater treatment and disposal facility on four parcels of land in the vicinity of Route 24 and Camp Arrowhead Road, south of Love Creek near Rehoboth Beach. Three of the four parcels are in Delaware’s coastal zone.

Tidewater Environmental Services Inc., an affiliated company of Middlesex Water Co., provides wastewater services to approximately 1,800 residential customers in Delaware.

The company is seeking a Coastal Zone Act permit to construct and operate a facility that will treat up to 3 million gallons per day of residential/domestic wastewater by using membrane bioreactor technology with rapid infiltration basins and spray irrigation to recharge the aquifer.

The anticipated environmental effects of the facility include the addition of approximately 54,000 pounds of nitrogen and 4,437 pounds of phosphorus per year through land-applied treated wastewater.

In addition, approximately 8,000 pounds per day of biosolids are anticipated to be generated. The company’s proposed offset plan includes substituting treated wastewater effluent for commercial fertilizer applications, installing and using buffers around the project site, and eliminating existing and potential on-site septic systems.

The anticipated biosolids will be transported to a disposal site outside the coastal zone.

Locally the permit application can be inspected at the Delaware Department of Natural Resources and Environmental Control offices at 89 Kings Highway, Dover, and Georgetown Public Library, 10 West Pine St., Georgetown.

For more information, contact Kevin Coyle, principal planner, at 302-739-9909. T

he Delaware Coastal Zone Act Program regulates existing heavy industrial activities, as well as new and existing manufacturing activities in Delaware’s Coastal Zone through a status decision and permit process.

For program information, visit www.dnrec.delaware.gov/Admin/CZA/Pages/CZAHome.aspx

Source: Delaware Department of Natural Resources and Environmental Control press release