letters Strip mining control
DEAR SIR: Many thanks for your comprehensive article on coal strip mining (ES&T, January 1972, p 27) and your mention of Conservation Foundation testimony presented by Malcolm Baldwin of our staff before congressional committees. I want to correct your reference to the Conservation Foundation as an environmental lobby similar to the Sierra Club, however. This does not accurately describe our tax status. The Foundation is a tax-deductible, tax-exempt organization which, unlike the Sierra Club, cannot in any substantial way seek to influence legislation. Our testimony before Congress was by committee invitation. I might also note, in a substantive vein, that our position differs from that of the Sierra Club, in that we advocate
abolition of contour stripping only, and stringent regulation, but not necessarily abolition, of flatland or area stripping. In that respect, we differ with several other environmental groups. Sydney Howe, President The Conservation Foundation Washington, DC 20036
Sewers and groundwater
DEAR SIR: Your criticism of the government’s simplistic approaches to the funding of water pollution control (November 1971, editorial) is both well taken and timely. It is particularly pertinent to the situation in Long Island’s Nassau and Suffolk Counties, where sanitation officials have opted for environmentally and
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economically disastrous sewer and sewage treatment plant construction programs, without a comprehensive consideration of alternative approaches. Sewers and sewage treatment plants serve a useful function in densely populated metropolitan areas which draw their supplies from and discharge their effluent into surface waterways. However, Long Island is entirely dependent on groundwater for its supplies, while its coastal waters support a rich ecosystem that is very sensitive to changes in salinity and other environmental parameters. Thus, the indiscriminate replacement of septic tanks by sewers and sewage treatment plants that dump their effluents into the bays poses a major threat to Long Island’s water supplies and to its coastal ecosystem. To add insult to injury, the cost of the program (Continued on p 194)
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Volume 6, Number 3, March 1972
193
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Clean up stack gases I
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to the average homeowner is expected to rival the price of his house! The primary justification for sewers lies in preventing the contamination of groundwater supplies by nitrates from human toilet wastes. (Incidentally, sewers do nothing to curtail nitrate contamination by fertilizers, which are estimated to contribute about half of the loading in Suffolk County.) Other water-borne wastes are either degraded or filtered out in the soil (e.g., organic matter, phosphates), or banned (e.g., surfactants). Thus, if separate disposition could be provided for toilet wastes, which constitute less than 1 % of an average household's waste load, the remaining waste water could be recycled through the purifying mechanisms of the soil to replenish groundwater supplies. Fortunately, modern technology is able to provide for such separate disposal by thermal, chemical, or biological treatment. Several manufacturers are offering such systems at a small fraction of the cost of sewers and none of their adverse environmental effects. Why then have these innovations not been adopted in Nassau and Suffolk Counties? The rhetoric is long and tortuous, but it all boils down to the fact that most sanitation officials abhor innovative approaches, in spite of the immense economic and environmental benefits that would accrue. Alex Hershaft Environmental Technology Seminar Bethpage, N Y 11714
Missouri controls strippers
DEAR SIR: In your January 1972 article on surface mine legislation (p 27), you state that Missouri does not have legislation controlling the surface mining of coal. This is not correct. The 1971 Missouri General Assembly passed bills regulating the surface mining of coal and other minerals. These bills impose a bonding requirement on surface miners that is designed to ensure that the affected land is reclaimed. This legislation can be found in Chapter 444 of the Revised Statutes of Missouri, 1971 Supplement.
Peter H. Ruger Assistant Attorney General State of Missouri Jefferson City, M O 65101 0
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We regret the error--Ed.
