Tuesday, December 20, 2005

Metro Wastewater Reclamation District wins awards Here's an article about the Metro Wastewater District from Yahoo! News. Metro treats most of the wastewater from the Denver Metropolitan Area. From the article, "The Metro Wastewater Reclamation District, which provides sewage treatment service for 1.5 million people in metropolitan Denver, had a 'grand slam' year in 2005, winning four major environmental honors and a safety award. "In May, Metro Wastewater won its second consecutive Platinum Award from the National Association of Clean Water Agencies (NACWA; formerly the Association of Metropolitan Sewerage Agencies) for its second five-year period without a single numerical violation of its discharge permit. At year end 2005, Metro Wastewater has amassed 11.5 years without a numerical violation of its discharge permit. "In July, Metro Wastewater was notified that, as a result of it having passed a voluntary third-party, independent audit of its Environmental Management System (EMS) for Biosolids by the National Biosolids Partnership, its EMS had been certified. That made Metro Wastewater the eighth wastewater treatment agency in the U.S. to have its EMS certified by the National Biosolids Partnership. The EMS for Biosolids is completely voluntary. "In September, Metro Wastewater was awarded the Rocky Mountain Water Environment Association's Biosolids Management Merit Award at that association's annual meeting in Albuquerque, N.M. The award recognized Metro Wastewater for the overall excellence of its biosolids management program." Category: Colorado Water 6:21:19 AM     Cloud-seeding in Wyoming Wyoming is paying $8.8 million to test and document the success or not of cloud-seeding program, according to HappyNews.com. From the article, "However, whether cloud seeding actually works has been the subject of debate among the scientific community. In 2003, the National Academy of Sciences questioned the science behind cloud seeding and called for national research into the practice. The Wyoming project seeks to determine whether cloud seeding can increase runoff from three mountain ranges - the Wind River, Medicine Bow and Sierra Madre. The project is in its early stages, and no cloud seeding is expected to begin until next year." Category: Colorado Water 6:06:54 AM     Pumping from alluvial wells From today's Denver Post: "Leaders of the property-rights movement will meet Wednesday with Colorado farmers who have been forced to reduce or shut off irrigation wells. Wayne Hage, a Nevada rancher who claims in a pending lawsuit that the federal government illegally took his property rights, will address farmers at 7 p.m. at the Country Steak-Out restaurant in Fort Morgan. He will be joined by his wife, former Congresswoman Helen Chenoweth- Hage, in the restaurant's meeting room. A Colorado Supreme Court decision on groundwater pumping has forced many farmers in the South Platte River basin to replace water their wells consume or shut them down. The court forbade groundwater wells to continue taking water out of priority from those who hold senior rights on the river. Affected farmers contend that the state, which permitted their wells for decades, took their property without compensation." Category: Colorado Water 5:43:37 AM

© Copyright 2006 John Orr. Last update: 12/29/06; 10:53:38 AM.