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Berkeley ETHSTD 196 - Cost Comparison of Storm Water Filters & Remediation Techniques

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Cost Comparison of Storm Water Filters & Remediation Techniques Sarah Hoehn Introduction Urban runoff has been reported as the second most frequent cause of surface water pollution in the United States. The United States Environmental Protection Agency has reported that 87 percent of the major water basins in the country are affected by non-point source pollutants (Walker, 1998). The problem concerning urban runoff includes non-point management practices so that the combination of a city's runoff doesn't create contamination in the nearby streams and rivers. There is considerable controversy about the technical appropriateness and the cost-effectiveness of requiring cities to control contaminants in urban storm water discharges to meet state water quality standards (Jones-Lee and Lee, 1994). In 1987, Section 402(p) was added to the Clean Water Act to establish a framework for addressing storm water discharges under the National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System (NPDES) program. In California the Clean Water Enforcement and Pollution Prevention Act of 1999 states a new requirement authorizing Regional Water Quality Control Boards (RWQCB) and Publicly Owned Treatment Works to require NPDES permittees and industrial users (i.e., indirect dischargers) to prepare and implement pollution prevention plans (Hickox, 1999). Therefore, all 11,258 gas stations in the state of California should have pollution prevention plans involving the use of best management practices. Storm water quality best management practices (BMPs) range from non-structural contaminant control programs, such as the control of illegal connections and illicit discharges, to structural controls such as detention basins, grassy swales, and treatment works similar to those used for domestic and industrial waste waters (Jones-Lee and Lee, 1994). Some examples of simple regulatory BMPs for fuel dispensing areas are the using of dry clean-up methods such as sweeping for removal of litter and debris and the use of rags and absorbents for leaks and spills. Also, fueling areas should never be washed down unless the wash water is collected and disposed of properly. Another simple BMP for gas stations is labeling drains to indicate whether they flow to an oil/water separator, directly to the sewer, or to a storm drain. Unfortunately, gas station BMPs are often dependent on educating the employees on the situation concerning more government regulated clean up, so the accumulation of pollutants in our waterways continues togrow due to a lack of employee education. Other BMPs such as oil/water separators and catch basin inserts/filters are still being studied for efficiency and should become more utilized as more research is done. A company called Stormwater Compliance International manufactures many different styles of filter inserts used to extract different pollutants from runoff. In a third party test report, done by the Environmental Technical Services, it was stated that these media have the ability to remove substances such as various aromatics that occur in fuels (benzene, toluene, xylenes, etc.), as well as other volatile (VOC) compounds, from water, and in effect, sequester them away from the environment until they dissipate (Conrad, 1999). When dealing with retail gas stations, small, localized spills often occur and have growing affects on the environment. These can be corrected by the use of media filters. Retail Gasoline Outlets (RGOs) contain a number of different pollutants in their runoff which need to be controlled. Petroleum products contain the aromatic hydrocarbons benzene, toluene, ethylbenzene, and xylenes, otherwise known as BTEX, alkanes, and polynuclear aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) that are some of the most common contaminants of soils, sediments, and waters (Pierzynski, 2000). Without sufficient regulations of BMPs, the surrounding areas contaminated will have to be remediated, and the more complicated the pollutant the more costly the remediation. Soils and water contaminated with organic substances often involve more than one compound. Therefore, more than one remediation method may be necessary to address all of the contamination (Pierzynski, 2000). In California there are over 600 sites that are contaminated with petroleum by-products (Kostecki, 1989). This paper is designed to determine whether using hydro-clean filter devices in storm drains of RGOs throughout California is more cost effective in comparison to the cost of remediation techniques to control pollution. The comparison involves an evaluation of general soil and sediment remediation techniques used for contamination, and the cost related to the remediation technique per area. In contrast to the above evaluation, another assessment was done concerning a filtering product and the cost for installation and maintenance of this product for a time period of thirty years. MethodsThe catch basin filters chosen for this comparison are part of the BMP of Stormwater Compliance International's new product line. The filter cost table was derived from the company's storm water filtration equipment catalog. The prices range by size and filter design with an average price range in the middle of the market. This filter can be used as an example of a wide variety of BMP products available today to control storm water runoff. The recommended filter model for a RGO from Stormwater Compliance International was the standard efficiency (SE) model with the price range, by size, shown in table 1. TABLE 1: FILTER COST ANALYSIS Recommended gas station filter SE model Prices steel frame 24x12 $ 195.00 overflow tray 24x12 $ 200.00 transition flow 24x12 $ 200.00 1 media SE tower $ 365.00 1 sediment chamber 5L $ 275.00 optional overflow capacity N/A 1 media tower lid $ 20.00 Total filter price $ 1,255.00 3 replacement media bags/year $ 195.00 Smallest SE filter model steel frame 12x12 $ 180.00 overflow tray 12x12 $ 100.00 transition flow 12x12 N/A 1 media SE tower $ 365.00 sediment chamber N/A optional overflow capacity N/A 1 media tower lid N/A Total filter price $ 645.00 3 replacement media bags/year $ 195.00 Largest SE filter model steel frame 48x48 $ 405.00 overflow tray 48x48 $ 1,600.00 transition flow 48x48 $ 1,600.00 8 media SE towers $ 2,920.00 8 Sediment chambers 5L $ 2,200.00 optional overflow capacity N/A 8


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Berkeley ETHSTD 196 - Cost Comparison of Storm Water Filters & Remediation Techniques

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