Meet the most expensive sewage treatment plant in the history of the world: NIMBY
I think the people of King County, that’s where Seattle is, have Boston envy. Boston has the Big Dig, the most expensive public works project since the great pyramids, and now we have Brightwater, the most expensive sewage treatment plant in the history of the world. Not that the two have anything to do with each other. I make the connection because Seattle also has an elevated arterial that some of the locals want to bury in a tunnel behind a sea wall right along the waterfront. Now you get it.
So, sewage treatment. Amateur comedians insert your favorite jokes here. I’m not up on all the issues involved, but I get the general idea and why it’s important: we generate the stuff regularly, some of us more regularly than others, and just pumping it out to sea no longer cuts it. The stuff needs to be processed to a standard that exceeds the quality of the ingredients that go into our toothpaste and heparin before the harmless leftovers are released to recycle themselves. The big deal is where to put the facilities. And that’s where the story gets muddy according to the Seattle Times.
Officials don’t know of a plant this size anywhere that has cost so much.
In all, it will take 35 to 40 years of principal and interest payments to retire the $3 billion debt burden on Brightwater, scheduled to open in 2011 in Snohomish County north of Woodinville.
How did Brightwater get so pricey?
There are many reasons: engineering changes, technology that exceeds state and federal environmental requirements, and construction-industry inflation among them.
But above all was the simple truth that almost nobody wants a sewer plant near his home or business or beach.
That reality pushed the plant so far inland that a 13-mile, $735 million pipeline is being built to take treated waste to Puget Sound. It also meant installing the nation’s most advanced odor-control system and paying for parks and other goodies to win at least grudging acceptance from jurisdictions near the plant and pipeline.
A 43-acre habitat-restoration area overlooks the site, where massive concrete structures are rising from the hillside. Sewer bills will also pay $4 million for artwork and $8 million for an education center.
When it opens, the plant will serve 189,000 residents, 109,000 of them in Snohomish County, which for decades has sent some of its wastewater to King County.
These stories have a certain sameness to them. Decisions are all about trade-offs. People want to build bigger and bigger houses further and further out. They expect water when they get there. They also expect to be able to run their disposals and flush their toilets without having to keep an eye on a drain field (which is nothing but an on-site sewage treatment facility). But they also don’t want the ignominy of living near a pumping plant. Or a power plant. Or an airport. Or a major road. Or a factory. It’s called NIMBYism . . . not in my backyard.
So now the piper is presenting the big bill. No surprise here: Dealing with those kinds of large scale trade-offs is expensive, as the Taj Mahal price tag for Brightwater shows.
Tags: Brightwater, Big Dig, sewage, King County, Snohomish County, Decision Making, Decision Quality, NIMBY, Not in my Backyard