The Rest of the Bajagua Story
(page 2 of 2)
Budgets
THE TWO FIGURES USED MOST in the Bajagua debate are $66 million and $600 million. President Bush’s proposed budget for 2008 calls for $66 million to upgrade the International Wastewater Treatment Plant in San Ysidro to secondary standards. The $600 million figure was used by the U.S. General Accountability Office to describe the expected outlay associated with the Bajagua proposal. But the GAO figure didn’t give a breakdown of construction costs or an operations-and-maintenance budget, and Bajagua officials question it. Bajagua opponents, meanwhile, say the company hasn’t given a detailed rendering of its expected costs, either—all of which leaves a giant and contentious question surrounding the true costs that can be expected with both plans.
Bajagua spokesperson Craig Benedetto says comparing $66 million to $600 million is like comparing apples to oranges, and he’s right. The $66 million figure (generally considered far less than the true cost of upgrading the IWTP facility) is a one-time construction fee and doesn’t take into account interest, unknown variables or operations and maintenance costs for the next 20 years (as the Bajagua plan does).
Though Bajagua hasn’t given specific numbers on its expected building or operations costs, a set of spending parameters was outlined in the now-suspended development agreement it signed with the International Boundary and Water Commission. That pre-contract indicated Bajagua expected to have a total operating budget of $34 million a year for 20 years (a total price tag of $640 million). In the agreement, the company said it would strive to bring that figure down to $30 million per year ($600 million over 20 years; the GAO figure) but that it reserved the right to charge up to $39 million per year ($780 million over 20 years).
The upgrade at San Ysidro, meanwhile, will cost far more than the $66 million figure being bandied about. Most experts agree it will cost at least $100 million; figures from the IBWC’s 2005 Supplemental Environmental Impact Statement put the figure as high as $127 million. The $66 million appropriation in the president’s budget, if it passes Congress, will only start the upgrade. To make the apples-to-apples analogy accurate, operating costs for 20 years have to be added to that figure. One California wastewater expert believes that, if given the money to do the upgrades at the IWTP, the IBWC will install an activated-sludge system (more expensive to run than aerated ponds) and that the process could add an extra $3 million to $4 million to the plant’s yearly operating costs. Figures from the SEIS show the commission believes an aerated pond system will cost $4 million to run every year, and an activated-sludge system will cost $6 million.
Using the SEIS’ higher values, it will cost an estimated $60 million (of 2004 adjusted dollars) to run an aerated pond system for 20 years and $80 million to run an activated-sludge system. Adding that to the $8.41 million it’s averaged to run the IWTP over the past five years (information gleaned from a Freedom of Information Act request at the IBWC)—$168 million over 20 years—it will cost taxpayers an estimated $328 million to $348 million (depending on the system employed) to build and run an secondary treatment center at the IWTP for the next 20 years.
Of the IWTP’s original $234 million budget, $90 million paid for the state-of-the-art South Bay Ocean Outfall, $8 million went to the Army Corps of Engineers, and $9 million went to studies and other associated costs; only $127 million of that outlay was directed to building the actual plant. Add to that $127 million to the $328 million to $348 million figure, and the expected 20-year cost to upgrade and run the plant is $455 million to $475 million.
However, the $127 million capital cost has already been paid, meaning the true cost to taxpayers will be $328 million or $348 million over 20 years. That figure, compared to Bajagua’s projected money flows—$600 million to $780 million over 20 years—is the apples-to-apples comparison.
The SEIS does a far more thorough job and investigates a number of engineering and economic impacts on eventual costs. It estimates that the three options involving a Bajagua-built Mexican plant would cost taxpayers $29.3 million to $29.7 million per year. The two IWTP upgrade options (aerated ponds or activated sludge), it says, would cost taxpayers $17.5 million and $21.6 million per year, for 20 years.
The SEIS (and other information regarding Bajagua and international \water issues) is available at the IBWC Web site (www.ibwc.state.gov/) and at www.ibwc.state.gov/Files/SBIWTPFinalSEIS.pdf.
Treatment & Lawsuits
PRIMARY TREATMENT removes large solids, sand and grit from sewage water and then allows it to sit for a period of time while the suspended solids settle to the bottom. Scum, oil and fats are also screened out. Advanced primary treatment adds a chemical to the water to enhance the settling of solids. The primary process rids wastewater of about 75 percent of contaminants.
Secondary treatment works on the biological level. Bacteria are introduced that feed on sugars, organic materials and the remnants of human waste, and oxygen is added to promote growth of the bacteria. The bacteria then settle to the bottom of tanks and become sludge. The system can be much more elaborate, using aerobic and anaerobic processes to promote consumption of the waste, but in the simple schematic, activated sludge (termed “activated” because bacteria levels have been artificially enhanced) is then either reintroduced into another part of the secondary process or collected for disposal with sludge and solids from the primary treatment stage (sludge is generally spread on fields or sold as fertilizer).
Secondary treatment removes roughly 85 percent of contaminants from wastewater and satisfies EPA standards and the Clean Water Act for discharge into the ocean. The International Wastewater Treatment Plant at San Ysidro was planned to clean water to secondary standards before discharging it 3.5 miles offshore in 93 feet of water (through the South Bay Ocean Outfall). A consortium of environmentalists—spearheaded by the Sierra Club, activist-turned-California Assemblywoman Lori Saldaña and the Surfrider Foundation—sued the International Boundary and Water Commission to force the commission to alter its secondary plans. The environmentalists wanted aerated ponds used instead of activated sludge, a process that produces a less noxious byproduct. Before the lawsuit went through, the IBWC had already run out of money (it had paid $90 million to build the 11-foot-wide South Bay Ocean Outfall and another $8 million to the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers), and Congress was loath to open up the $234 million cap it had put on the project.
Out of money, and sued for its designs for secondary treatment, the IWTP couldn’t move forward with the second phase of construction. But all concerned—the state of California, the environmentalists and the IBWC—realized the futility of preventing the plant from its primary treatment operations, and so the California Water Quality Control Board granted the IBWC a temporary permit for ocean discharge of water that was treated only to advanced primary standards—which violated the Clean Water Act. The IWTP has been discharging water that doesn’t meet American water-quality standards from the day it began operations in April 1997, and construction on the aerated ponds (the IBWC had paid for designs on both types of secondary systems, activated sludge and aerated ponds) has yet to begin.
Click here to read the feature article "A Sewer Runs Through It"
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