A panel of four certified Big Brains when it comes to high tech water technology held the first of four public workshops this Wednesday in Santa Barbara City Hall to explore the feasibility of converting the six million gallons of treated sewage water the City of Santa Barbara flushes out to sea each day into potable water. In addition, the panel — convened by the National Water Research Institute — will explore the extent to which more environmentally kinder, gentler sea water intake technology could be deployed at the city’s soon-to-be-refurbished desalination plant as opposed to the surface intake valves now approved — and decried by Channelkeeper and other environmental organizations — that will lie along the bottom of the ocean floor sucking in more than 15,000 gallons of sea water per minute.
The results of this study must be completed and turned into the Regional Water Quality Control Board (RWQCB) by June 2017, about half a year after the desalination plant is scheduled to begin production. What impact the alternative study can have is a matter of great conjecture. If any feasible alternatives were to be identified, there’s no requirement that City Hall actually do anything but consider the report.
When RWQCB bestowed its blessing on City Hall’s existing desalination permits this January, its members were of many minds and hearts on the matter. It turned out the existing permits for the plant, which opened in 1992 and shut down 419 acre-feet later in 1994, were issued without one of two key findings having been made. Glaringly missing was the finding that the desal plant’s impact on surrounding sea life had been mitigated to the maximum extent feasible. Back in January, it appeared two major lawsuits could be filed in response to the proposed desalination plant. First, City Hall made it clear it would go nuclear if RWQCB sought to interfere with the desal plant. Secondly, environmentalists were rattling sabers about a possible lawsuit based on insufficient environmental review. In response to all that legal bluster, Mayor Helene Schneider and the City Council voted unanimously to conduct this feasibility. RWQCB members took it a step further, requiring that the study be included as a permit condition for the desalination plant. Some board members argued City Hall should be bound by the study results — whatever they were — but City Hall made it clear that was unacceptable; a number of Big Shots with RWQCB’s parent agency showed up to say it was unacceptable to them too.