Ani­ka Gumbs-San­di­ford

Trinidad and To­ba­go tax­pay­ers are now faced with a bill es­ti­mat­ed to cost $200 mil­lion for re­pair work on anaer­o­bic di­gester berms at the $226 mil­lion Beetham Waste­water Treat­ment Plant, which failed a decade ago. A Sun­day Guardian in­ves­ti­ga­tion re­vealed the anaer­o­bic di­gester berms, which formed part of the north wa­ter project, were poor­ly de­signed and led to the berms sink­ing at the start of con­struc­tion in 2000. New­ly-in­stalled Wa­ter and Sew­er­age Au­thor­i­ty (WASA) chief ex­ec­u­tive of­fi­cer, Gan­ga Singh was the then Pub­lic Util­i­ties Min­is­ter. The anaer­o­bic di­gester berms, in­ves­ti­ga­tions re­vealed, was de­signed for the three la­goons ex­pect­ed to treat the sew­er­age from the city of Port-of-Spain and in­dus­tri­al waste­water from An­gos­tu­ra Ltd.

To date, con­struc­tion has been halt­ed and waste con­tin­ues to flow freely in­to the Ca­roni Swamp, pos­ing a se­ri­ous health haz­ard on the en­vi­ron­ment and wildlife. When Sun­day Guardian vis­it­ed the area last week, a foul stench was em­a­nat­ing from the plant. Un­aware of the dan­ger, a man was seen tak­ing a bath in the murky wa­ter.

Prob­lem de­tect­ed af­ter com­mis­sion­ing

Fur­ther in­ves­ti­ga­tions re­vealed it was af­ter the Beetham Waste­water Plant was com­mis­sioned that of­fi­cials re­alised they were un­able to treat An­gos­tu­ra in­dus­tri­al waste. A WASA of­fi­cial re­vealed: "A de­ci­sion was tak­en and part of the pro­pos­al was to take An­gos­tu­ra waste­water di­rect­ly in­to the anaer­o­bic la­goon but when they start­ed build­ing the la­goon the berm failed and that part of the project was nev­er com­plet­ed. "The berm failed be­cause it was not prop­er­ly done and now this part of the work is es­ti­mat­ed to cost an­oth­er $200 mil­lion. For the last ten years An­gos­tu­ra in­dus­tri­al waste­water has been con­t­a­m­i­nat­ing the Ca­roni Swamp."

Con­firm­ing the failed project, WASA's com­mu­ni­ca­tions spe­cial­ist Ellen Lewis said the com­pa­ny was con­sid­er­ing oth­er forms for treat­ing in­dus­tri­al waste­water. Lewis, how­ev­er, said in­dus­tri­al waste from An­gos­tu­ra Ltd was be­ing ar­ti­fi­cial­ly treat­ed at the four old la­goons that they had dis­posed of. "The An­gos­tu­ra waste is ar­ti­fi­cial­ly be­ing treat­ed at the old la­goons which had been used to treat waste­water from the greater Port-of-Spain area be­fore the new plant was con­struct­ed," Lewis said.

High con­cen­tra­tion of pol­lu­tants

In­ves­ti­ga­tions re­vealed the plant was de­signed to treat ap­prox­i­mate­ly 75 mil­lion liters of sew­er­age on a dai­ly ba­sis from Port-of-Spain and en­vi­rons, and 1,500 cu­bic me­ters of waste­water from An­gos­tu­ra Ltd.

The of­fi­cial fur­ther ex­plained: "Even though it is on­ly 1,500 cu­bic me­ters of waste­water it has a high con­cen­tra­tion of pol­lu­tant. For every litre of An­gos­tu­ra's in­dus­tri­al waste­water the bi­o­log­i­cal oxy­gen de­mand is 50,000 mil­ligrams in com­par­i­son to sew­er­age, which is on­ly 300 mil­ligrams. There­fore, one litre of in­dus­tri­al waste­water is al­most equiv­a­lent to 165 litres of sew­er­age. Clear­ly, the waste­water is high­ly con­t­a­m­i­nat­ed."

Sun­day Guardian learnt that due to the fail­ure of the anaer­o­bic di­gester berms the sludge that is gen­er­at­ed by the waste is un­able to be treat­ed. "The sludge is al­so high­ly pol­lu­tant so it can­not be dis­posed of un­less it is treat­ed. This is where it was found that there was an ur­gent need for anaer­o­bic di­gester berms be­cause when it is treat­ed, like a sep­tic tank the vol­ume is re­duced and then dis­posed for land­fill or ma­nure. The project was to re­move the sludge from the old la­goons that have been ex­ist­ing for more than 20 years, do the con­crete lin­ing, build the berms and put a cov­er on top of the la­goons so you can have anaer­o­bic treat­ment," the of­fi­cial said.

An­gos­tu­ra re­sponds

When con­tact­ed, An­gos­tu­ra's com­mu­ni­ca­tions spe­cial­ist Giselle Laronde-West ad­mit­ted that WASA in­formed the com­pa­ny that the di­gester berms had failed and they have been seek­ing al­ter­na­tive op­tions.

Laronde-West said the com­pa­ny was in­formed that WASA con­tin­ues to treat the waste while per­son­nel car­ry out a rig­or­ous mon­i­tor­ing plan on the treat­ment plant. In ad­di­tion, Laronde-West said on­ly a few months ago EMA of­fi­cials vis­it­ed the Beetham Waste­water Plant to view the process. Laronde-West said the la­goons are specif­i­cal­ly de­signed anaer­o­bic ponds for treat­ment of in­dus­tri­al waste with nat­ur­al fil­tra­tion and do not need to be cov­ered.

EMA: An­gos­tu­ra be­ing in­ves­ti­gat­ed

Whether An­gos­tu­ra and WASA are both in breach of En­vi­ron­ment Man­age­ment Au­thor­i­ty (EMA) stan­dards, com­mu­ni­ca­tions spe­cial­ist Kar­ryl White­hall said the mat­ter was be­ing in­ves­ti­gat­ed. "At this point the EMA is look­ing at An­gos­tu­ra Ltd ef­flu­ent dis­charges with a view of An­gos­tu­ra Ltd com­ply­ing with the wa­ter pol­lu­tion rules. The EMA has wa­ter pol­lu­tion rules that or­gan­i­sa­tions have to com­ply with. We are look­ing at An­gos­tu­ra Ltd," White­hall said.

About treat­ment

In waste­water treat­ment the ab­sence of oxy­gen is in­di­cat­ed as anox­ic; and anaer­o­bic is used to in­di­cate the ab­sence of a com­mon elec­tron ac­cep­tor such as ni­trate, sul­phate or oxy­gen. An anaer­o­bic ad­he­sive is a bond­ing agent that doesn't cure in the pres­ence of air.