Tag Archives: septic systems

Human waste may end oyster harvesting on the May River. Can Bluffton clean it up?

Larry Toomer’s business depends on the May River. On a cold January morning, he stood on the boat ramp outside the Bluffton Oyster Co. with a paper cup of steaming gas station coffee in hand. A lifetime of wrestling shrimping nets has left him with a sturdy build. His rose-colored face is in stark contrast with his ghost-white hair. Behind him, dense clouds of powdery fog swallowed the river, giving his shrimp trawler the illusion of flight. The well-worn ship is easily two stories tall. “Daddy’s Girls” is painted in black-and-blue block lettering on the side. Named for his three daughters, the trawler has become the unofficial town seal. When a home is on a septic system, he said, everything that is flushed down the drain goes into a tank below the house. The solids are filtered out and held in the tank. The liquids go into a drain field below. “Do you understand what I’m saying?” Toomer said, elaborating on the path of human excrement. “Every day, right out the toilet.” >click to read< 15:41

Ecosystems Are Dying as Long Island Contends With a Nitrogen Bomb

Thousands of dead bunker fish and hundreds of diamondback turtles washed ashore last May in Peconic Bay on the east end of Long Island, New York. Fed by warming waters and a stream of nitrogen, a foul bloom of algae had so depleted the estuary of oxygen that marine life suffocated. The waters of the bay swirled red and brown. Basic septic units are not designed to remove nitrogen. When too many households with septic are clustered too densely, nitrogen levels spike. Converted into ammonium in the tank and then nitrate in the soil, nitrogen seeps into groundwater and ends up in rivers, lakes, and bays, where it feeds a menagerie of algae species. Read the rest here 21:32

NH Seacoast communities rising to nitrogen challenge

seacoastonlinelogoBecause of state and federal environmental regulatory concerns over nitrogen levels in Great Bay, the communities within the Great Bay watershed are being required to reduce man-made sources of nitrogen. These new requirements will affect everyone within the watershed. Read more@seacoastonline  09:17