RCAA ONLINE LIBRARY
Water Pollution
Issues in Brief: (For background information about streams & other water resources near Sea-Tac Airport, see Wetlands.)
Sea-Tac Airport has been polluting local streams for half-a-century, with no end insight. As the Airport has grown in size, the volume of air traffic has expanded, resulting in many more passenger planes with much larger engines, producing a growing water-pollution problem.
Some pollution is captured on-site in an Industrial Wastewater System, receiving some treatment before being sent to a local sewer district. A lot of pollution escapes into the creeks that run through the cities of Burien, Des Moines, and Normandy Park on their way to Puget Sound. The impacts on fish are immediate and obvious. Contaminants include glycols (de-icing compounds), zinc, copper, and silt from construction work.
The Department of Ecology is the principal regulator. The principal regulatory tool is a renewable State-Federal water pollution permit, the “NPDES” or “sec. 402” permit. (For details about this type of permit, see our page “The National Pollutants Discharge Elimination System permit” [link].)
A long-term issue is to ensure that the Port itself pays for the work needed to protect water resources from Port activities, rather than leaving the downstream cities to pick up the tab.
The immediate issues are to prevent further loss of wetlands (about 20 acres are to be destroyed by the runway project, with replacement promised), to keep streamflow in balance (no excess flooding in wet times, no stream-death in the annual Summer drought), & to control & eliminate pollution from the Airport (principal source), & from roadways, parking lots, & businesses. The struggle to keep the Port in compliance with applicable permit conditions, rules, regulations, statute law, and neighborly behavior is constant.
Documents:
A
Brief Chronology of Water Pollution Issues 1949-1957.
A compilation of correspondence between the Port of Seattle,
Washington State's Department of Ecology, and other agencies,
officials and citizens dating back 50 years concerning pollution
of Miller and Des Moines Creeks as well as other water quality
issues related to SeaTac airport. [Acrobat
Version- 626KB, 62 pages]
Discharge
Monitoring Reports(DMR's) 1996.
Recent Discharge Monitoring Reports (DMR's) Filed by the Port of Seattle. These
reports are filed by the Port of Seattle in order to determine whether the
Port is in compliance with its National Pollution Discharge Elimination System
(NPDES) permit which is issued to the Port by Washington State's Department
of Ecology. The DMR's report concentration of chemicals contained in the effluent
discharged from Port property into outfalls surrounding the airport. [Acrobat
version - 182KB, 13 pages]
Draft NPDES Permit issued for public comments
2/28/03 Draft
NPDES National Discharge Elimination Permit [Acrobat - 42KB, 82
pages]
2/28/03Public Notice [Acrobat file- 94KB, 1 page]
2/28/03 Draft Facts Sheet [Acrobat
file- 747KB, 88 pages]
4/21/03 Comment of RCAA on Draft NPDES Permit [Acrobat file -182KB, 7 pages]
NPDES Permit Issued
by Washington State Department of Ecology
on September 4, 2003. Appeals due by October 2003.
10/06/03 Puget Soundkeeper Alliance Appeal of Sea-Tac Airport's NPDES Permit [Acrobat file - 133 KB, 6 pages]
10/__/03 Port of Seattle Appeal of Sea-Tac Airport's NPDES Permit [Acrobat file - 160 KB, 9 pages]
(10/5/03) Case/ACC Appeal of Sea-Tac Airport's NPDES Permit [Acrobat file - 187 KB, 19 pages]
09/04/03 National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System Waste Discharge Permit No. WA-002465-1, State of Washington, Department of Ecology [Acrobat file - 1.24MB, 88 pages ]
04/26/04 Citizen
Groups' Motion for Summary Judgement
A joint motion for partial summary judgement filed on April 26,
Citizens Against Sea-Tac Expansion (C.A.S.E.) & Puget Soundkeeper
Alliance. It says that the permit is invalid because it allows discharge
of polluted water from the Airport into Puget Sound without requiring
pre-discharge treatment by all known, available, and reasonable methods
of preventing, controlling, and treating pollution (“AKART”). State
law requires that all discharges into surface waters must be subject
to AKART.
In July 2004 , the Pollution Control Hearings Board heard the Port's appeal of its permit and cross appeals by Citizens Against Sea-Tac Expansion (CASE) & the Puget Sound Keeper's Alliance. Below are the pre-hearing briefs.
ACC & CASE
Pre-Hearing Brief [.pdf file 268Kb]
Puget Soundkeeper's Alliance Pre-Hearing
Brief [.pdf file 215Kb]
Port of Seattle Pre-Hearing
Brief [.pdf file 1.21Mb]
Background on NPDES Permit Issues before PCHB in July 2004 [.pdf file 124Kb]
10/18/04 Public Controls Hearings Board ruling on Port of Seattle's Appeal of Section 402 Water Pollution Appeal. [.pdf file, 141KB, 84 pages]
10/18/04
Brief analysis of the ruling by attorney Rick Poulin [.pdf
file, 106 KB, 3 pages]
8/24/05 Agreement between C.A.S.E, RCAA, and the Port of Seattle [.pdf file, 2.7MB, 18 pages]
After many months of debate over the details of the Port's NPDES permit, in August 2005, two citizen groups & the Port of Seattle signed a binding agreement to settle most of the issues remaining unresolved in the much-disputed basic water-pollution permit for Sea-Tac Airport. On the most critical issues, all parties agreed on the provisions to be included in the final, revised permit, pledging that there would be no appeals to the Pollution Control Hearings Board on these matters. Agreement was not reached on a few points, but the informal understanding is that there will be no appeals on these, either.
Section 401 Permit
June 2004
Revised 401 Certificate &
Revised Order [.pdf file 2.27MB]
Port Letter of May 26 [.pdf
file 33KB]
ACC Letter of
Complaint May 28, 2004 [.pdf file
199KB]
ACC Appeal [.pdf file 307KB]
Section 401 Permit, issued by the Department of Ecology and Appealed to the Washington State Pollution Control Hearings Board. The Hearings Board ruled. The legislature attempted to override this ruling with the infamous "dirty fill bill." The ruling was appealed by the Port, the fill bill issue was folded into the case by the Washington State Supreme Court (See Sept. 2003) The State Supreme court issued its ruling in May 2004.
Pollution Controls Hearings Board Decision August 12, 2002 (134 pages)
Analysis of Pollution Control Hearings Board 8/12/02 decision on Section 401 permit application by Kevin Stock Attorney for ACC (Airport Communities Coalition)
February of 2001 comments on the Section 401-404 Permit ApplicationRegional Commission on Airport Affairs (These are general comments that cover the broad issues, a good introduction)
Airport Communities Coalition (Consists of a variety of expert comments, well worth reading)
Individuals and other organizations (We have a large number of comments from individuals and have selected a sampling here of those that cover interesting issues or provide special expertise)
Home | What's the Latest? | Links | Library | Newsletter | About Us
