Environmental Stewardship Appeals Corix Wastewater Permit

Environmental Stewardship is appealing a recent decision by the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality’s decision to permit a 10-fold increase in wastewater treated at LCRA’s McKinney Roughs Park in Bastrop. The appeal raises questions over whether Texas is following EPA rules for protecting the health of Lower Colorado River downstream of Austin where excessive algae blooms have become increasingly invasive and persistent.

“Plaintiff maintains the Commission’s decision to approve Corix’s application is the product of numerous errors and must be reversed,” according to Eric Allmon, Environmental Stewardship’s Austin attorney who filed the appeal.

The Corix Utilities permit authorizes the discharge of up to 500,000 gallons per day of treated domestic effluent from a wastewater treatment facility located inside LCRA’s McKinney Roughs Park in Wilbarger Bend. The appeal challenges TCEQ’s assessment that increasing in the plant’s 50,000-gallon discharge limitation will not exacerbate the river’s nutrient problem caused by high nutrients levels allowed under TCEQ wastewater parameters.

Corix attorneys and TCEQ staff dismissed those concerns, arguing that some algae blooms can provide beneficial habitats for aquatic life and that the park’s relatively small discharge will have negligible impact.

Nutrient-rich wastewater concerns date back 20 years

Nutrient overload in the river between Austin and Bastrop first reached a “level of concern” for TCEQ in 2006. The agency, however, has failed to address those concerns with its water quality monitoring efforts, says Steve Box, executive director of Environment Stewardship. With so much growth upstream of Bastrop, it has been estimated that more than half of the water flowing past McKinney Roughs has been treated. Far greater than fertilizer runoff from agriculture and lawn care, wastewater has been responsible for the influx of algae blooms that have impaired recreational and fishing activities for Environmental Stewardship members.

One member, Richard Martin, an avid Bastrop angler who was granted standing in the case, no longer fishes in the river.

’The contamination of downstream waters, including the consequent algal growth due to the discharge of nutrients, will both decrease the availability of fish and create algal conditions that will impair his ability to engage in fishing activities to the same degree as he has for the past 50 years,” the appeal states.

Among the evidence submitted during an administrative hearing earlier this year were two photographs near the outfall where Corix wastewater enters the river. Those photograph, submitted by Friends of the Land, were a major point of contention during the contest case’s two-day administrative hearing presided by Judge…

The algae infestation depicted in the photos supported recent LCRA water and aquatic life studies showing that excessive nutrients in this segment of the river are already suffering from excessive algal growth.

“The receiving waters are more sensitive to nutrient impacts than was recognized by the ED (TCEQ executive director). The ED did not adequately consider the demonstrated potential for algal growth to attach to the bottom and sides of the receiving waters. Nor did the ED adequately consider the fact that the Colorado River at this location is dominated by effluent flow.”

TCEQ staff working on the Corix permit testified that “TCEQ has seen no evidence of excessive attached algae in this segment of the river.”

Earlier this year, a similar contested case hearing on Liberty Hills wastewater expansion permit resulted in Judge Smith siding with landowners downstream of the facility where excessive algae made that portion of the San Gabriel River unfit for recreation. The city is appealing the decision, which was upheld by TCEQ commissioners. It would force the plant to substantially reduce the 1.0 mg/L phosphorous limit initially approved by TCEQ to 0.2mg/L. The appeal’s main contention is that the technological upgrade to achieve that level would be too costly.

Environmental Stewardship is asking that similar levels be imposed on new wastewater permits that discharge into the river between Austin and LaGrange. That stretch of the river was designated “ exceptional high water quality” by the state legislature nearly 40 years ago after Bastrop’s CLearn Clear Colorado sued Austin for not upgrading its wastewater facilities. Once again, Austin is undertaking a $1 billion upgrade of its Walnut Creek wastewater plant, in large part because of its contribution (75 million gallons per day) to algae infestation and declining aquatic life.

“Full recognition of these factors, and full recognition of the reduction of phosphorus that can reasonably be achieved, demonstrates that the (Corix) Draft Permit should have contained a phosphorus limit of 0.02 mg/L,” the appeal states.

Although Judge Smith did not rule in favor of adopting a similar limit for the Corix plant, lawyers for TCEQ’s Office of Public Interest Counsel, argued in favor of that recommendation.

Corix case among first to address forever chemicals

The contested case filed by Environmental Stewardship is one of the first to challenge the agency for not regulating Texas waterways for contaminants of emerging concern, particularly per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS).

Texas is among a handful of states that have not yet implemented an EPA directive to set limits on PFAS for wastewater, as well as drinking water. Environmental Stewardship’s appeal is challenging TCEQ’s wait-and-see position based on claims from Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton’s recent lawsuit against 3M and other forever chemical manufactures.

That petition, filed earlier this year, states that PFAS are “persistent, bio-accumulative, and toxic” and exposure in humans may be associated with diseases such as cancer and decreased vaccine response. Further, it goes on, once PFAS are introduced into the environment, they “accumulate in fish, game, and other animal and plant life, contaminate drinking water and other natural resources, and accumulate in the blood of humans.”

Other assertions in the Environmental Stewardship appeal include evidence that TCEQ underestimated the impact of dissolved oxygen concentrations on algae growth, used wrong water temperatures in its permit modeling assessments, and failed to adequately address the need for an odor control plan prior to permit approval. Corey’s failure to submit a nuisance odor plant prior to construction of its new wastewater treatment plant precluded public input, according to Allmon:

” Such an approach was not procedurally warranted,” he wrote, “as it deprived the public of its only opportunity to evaluate and provide input on the odor control plan, which is particularly important given that the setting for the facility is a park.”

Despite the risk of violating TCEQ rules not to begin construction of the plant before the permit was approved, Corix completed the expansion and upgrade this summer in order to meet demand from new customers outside the park, which include a recently completed apartment complex on Highway 71, not far from an existing customer, Cedar Creek High School. The school is also undergoing an expansion to meet the county’s rapid population growth spurred by Elon Musk moving three of his companies to Bastrop.