Read CCE's new report, "Promoting Sustainable Water Solutions That Save Energy, Water, and Money: Alternatives to Hudson River Desalination"
The Hudson River is an important estuary that contributes to New York’s economy, heritage, recreation, environment, and aesthetic beauty. The health of the Hudson River is vital to the livelihood of the many communities on both sides of the river. For many years, CCE and other environmental groups have sought to protect, preserve, and restore the Hudson. Haverstraw Bay is in the lower region of the Hudson River and is designated a significant coastal fish and wildlife habitat because of its significant value as a nursery for numerous fish and other aquatic species.
United Water, a subsidiary of Suez Environment, is proposing a desalination plant at Haverstraw Bay in Rockland County, NY. The proposal consists of an intake facility, an intake pumping station, a water treatment plant that will use reverse osmosis technology, piping for the water transport, and potential upgrades to the Joint Regional Sewage Treatment Plant (JRSTP) to be built along the Hudson River.
Desalination plants should not be proposed for these ecological significant areas. Maintaining Haverstraw Bay is a crucial part in the overall process of preserving the Hudson River Estuary.
What is Desalination?
Desalination is a process to remove salt and minerals from salt water to produce drinkable water. There are several different methods to desalinate water. Reverse osmosis is the most common process, used in 96% of desalination plants in the United States. During reverse osmosis, salt water is pumped along a porous cylindrical membrane at high pressure, which prevents the passage of small particles, salts, and other chemicals, but allows the desalinated water to pass through for human consumption. It takes two to three gallons of salt water to make one gallon of fresh water, depending on the saline content of the brackish Hudson River water. A higher salt concentration in the water body makes the desalination process less efficient. Desalinating water produces several types of waste products: The reverse osmosis process creates a solid byproduct, comprised of everything filtered from the clarified water. This can include high concentrations of salts, minerals, chemicals, or any other pollutants including heavy metals and PCBs. The residual solid waste is typically collected and landfilled. The liquid waste containing concentrated salt brine is returned back to the source water.
While desalinating water may be the only solution in arid and drought stricken regions, there are numerous environmental and social problems associated with this technology, including:
Intensive Energy Consumers
Desalination plants are factories that require enormous amounts of energy. Locally, most of this energy would be derived from nuclear, coal, oil, and gas. Desalination plants that were studied in California use approximately 9 times the energy of surface water treatment and 14 times the energy as ground water production. The proposed desalination facility will use between 4,427 and 6,520 kilowatt hours of electricity per million gallons of water produced (kWh/Mgal). The average New York household will use the same amount of energy in 8 to 10 months. Since the desalination plant is expected to produce 7.5 million gallons of water each day, its daily energy use would be between 33,202.5 and 48,900 kWh per day.
Increasing local energy demand intensifies dependence on fossil fuels, further congests already outdated and constrained energy grids, and emits harmful climate change and smog-producing pollution.
Local Habitat Destruction
The water intake stations of desalination facilities, similar to power plants kill larvae, eggs, juveniles, and adult fish in two key ways:
- Entrainment – the capture of aquatic organisms with the water through the intake valve; and
- Impingement – the fatal pinning of organisms too large to fit through the mesh screens.
Fish mortalities, due to entrainment and impingement, vary based on the quantity and speed of the water that passes through the intake valve. The amount of marine life in the area of the intake station also plays an important factor in loss of marine life. Haverstraw Bay is an important nursery area for: Stripped Bass, American Shad, White Perch, Tomcod, and Atlantic Sturgeon, Anchovy, and Blueclaw Crab. A desalination plant could interfere with the protection of these critical fisheries and habitats, particularly for the Atlantic Sturgeon, which was recently added to endangered species list.
Harmful Discharges
High concentrations of salts, minerals, chemicals, or any other pollutants including heavy metals and PCBs will be returned to the Hudson River after the water has been extracted. These discharges are called brine discharges and they can impact benthic creatures that may be unable to survive in an environment altered with higher concentrations of salts and minerals.
Water Infrastructure Overload
The United Water proposal plans to send the discharges to the Joint Regional Sewage Treatment Plant (JRSTP) to deal with the excess waste. United Water’s proposal would increase the daily amount of waste by some 90,000 gallons per day at full capacity. With the addition of up to 90,000 gallons per day of highly salty water can increase the rate of corrosion and oxidization of the pipes, thus increasing the amount and cost of repairs needed for the future. United Water will not be responsible for the long-term maintenance of the sewage plant.
Rate Increases
Building, operating and maintaining desalination plants is expensive and will likely cause rate increases.Estimates by United Water anticipate the construction of the Rockland County desalination plant to cost up to $189 million, which would be paid for by increasing rates. Due to the immense amount of required energy, operational costs can potentially skyrocket due to their link to the already unpredictable energy market. Rockland’s rates have recently been raised to $4.28 per thousand gallons of water in the winter and $6.48 per thousand gallons of water for the summer months. Unanticipated problems during construction and maintenance, combined with increasing energy costs could cause Rockland’s water rates to further increase. For example, the initial cost to construct a Desalination facility in Tampa, Florida was projected to be $110 million and rose to $150 million. Currently, Tampa Bay Water has declined to run the plant at full capacity due to concerns about exorbitant rate increases. The example set by Tampa proves that problems can be prevalent and costs can easily increase to much higher than expected numbers.
Environmental Review Process
United Water first proposed the idea for a desalination plant in January of 2007 as a result of United Water’s rate case of 2006. As a result of the rate case, a Joint Proposal was reached between United Water and the New York State Public Service Commission which granted United Water permission to raise Rockland’s water rates. United Water, in turn, would supply more water to the County.
The NYS Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC) was designated lead agency for the review to assess the potential adverse impacts to the people, the Hudson, and the environment from a desalination plant. On May 7, 2009, the DEC hosted two public hearings to hear from the public on the "scope" of the environmental review of the proposed desalination facility. Comments on developing the scope of the document ended May 22, 2009. On December 30, 2010, the DEC determined that the Draft Environmental Impact Statement (DEIS) submitted by United Water was inadequate for public review because United Water failed to "evaluate the potential significant adverse environmental impacts at a level of detail that reflects the severity of the impacts and likelihood of their occurrence."
In January, 2012, the DEC accepted a revised version of United Water’s DEIS and issued draft permits for the desalination project. The DEC is accepting public comment on the DEIS until April 20, 2012, and is holding a public hearing on March 6 at Haverstraw Town Hall at 2pm and 6pm. The new version of DEIS does not consider a comprehensive sustainability plan as an alternative and fails to adequately address the potential impacts of the desalination plant on local habitat and Hudson River water quality. Additionally, United Water’s DEIS fails to properly address potential public health impacts of using an area of the Hudson so close to Indian Point Nuclear Facility as a drinking source.
'In addition to approval by the DEC, the NYS Department of State (DOS) must determine if the desalination proposal is consistent with Coastal Zone Management (CZM) policies. CZM policies are used to guide the state's efforts to create and maintain clean, accessible, and prosperous coastal areas and inland waterways for present and future generations. The policies are used to determine the appropriateness of public agency decisions that affect the use and protection of coastal areas and inland waterways.
The proposed desalination plant would be located in an area that is designated by NYS DOS as a Significant Coastal Fish and Wildlife Habitat. Recreational and commercial fisheries throughout the Hudson and the North Atlantic are dependent upon this important ecosystem. Critical habitat for fish and wildlife would be adversely impacted from water intake and discharge of harmful pollutants associated with desalination. Destroying or impairing the viability of habitat is inconsistent with CZM policies. A desalination plant in Haverstraw Bay is therefore inconsistent with CZM policies, and should be denied by the NYS DOS.
Support Cost Effective, Environmentally Friendly Infrastructure
The solution to Rockland County’s water question is not a large scale water industrial plant. The solution that is cheaper, safer, and healthier is employing green infrastructure and a real water conservation policy. Instead of being home to the first desalination facility in New York State, Rockland can set a precedent of conservation and be the first county in New York to say NO to a desalination proposal.
CCE’s Rockland County Sustainable Water Management campaign
Contact Governor Cuomo, the NYS DEC, and NYS Department of State and urge them to support enhanced local water conservation programs and a sustainable water management plan instead of an unnecessary and environmentally harmful desalination plant. Tell them:
- You oppose Hudson River desalination.
- The DEIS fails to adequately consider sustainable water management as an alternative.
- The proposed desalination plant would destroy local habitat and is therefore inconsistent with Coastal Zone Management Policy.
Contact:
Christopher Hogan |
Hon. Cesar A. Perales |
Hon. Andrew Cuomo |
Additional Information:
United Water’s Draft Environmental Impact Statement
Draft Permits for United Water’s Haverstraw Project
CCE’s Rockland County Sustainable Water Management campaign
CCE’s Scoping Comments on United Water’s Proposed Desalination Plant for the Hudson River
CCE works with the Rockland Coalition for Sustainable Water, a coalition of citizens and environmental organizations taking a critical look at the impacts ofthe proposal and to advocate sustainable water management policies, such as conservation.
All scoping comments submitted by the members of the Rockland Coalition for Sustainable Water (12.6MB)
Final Scoping Document for the Haverstraw Desalination Plant
Special Feature: Water Conservation
updated by jchristensen 4/17/12