Bay Water May Be Waste Water

For a little over the past month, the Monterey Bay Aquarium has been dumping thousands of gallons of waste water into the Monterey Bay, including the environmental protected area of Pacific Grove.

Each day the aquarium takes in 1,400 gallons of seawater per minute. This occurs twenty-four hours per day, 365-days per year. That means that over the course of one year, the Monterey Bay Aquarium will have accumulated and dumped hundreds of millions of waste water into the Monterey Bay.

According to the State Water Resources Control Board, there is absolutely nothing wrong with the aquarium dumping their waste water back into the bay. In October, the board actually approved a request made by the aquarium, allowing them to release their waste water back into the Monterey Bay.

Since 1983, the Monterey Bay has been dubbed an Area of Special Biological Influence and is part of the Ocean Plan, which states “the State Water Resources Control Board hereby finds and declares that protection of the quality of the ocean waters for use and enjoyment by the people of the State requires control of the discharge of waste to ocean waters.”

Since 1992, Monterey Bay has been claimed a National Marine Sanctuary, designated by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Association (NOAA) in order to protect a variety of habitats including shores, kelp forests, and an underwater canyon. In 2009, the boundaries of the sanctuary lines were pushed and expanded even further, making the protected area even larger.

So the question at hand is, after all this hooplah over making Monterey Bay a protected, national sanctuary, why is the State Water Resources Control Board allowing the aquarium to dump their waste water now?

According to the board, the aquarium’s environmental conservation efforts and outlets for public education “far outweigh any dangers posed by the millions of gallons of treated fish, bird, and mammal waste it dumps back into the bay.”

The Monterey Bay Aquarium has boasted about their “Striving for Sustainability Program” which includes a series of different educational mediums. These mediums include videos, pamphlets, and informational seminars about different environmental issues affecting not only the Monterey Bay, but the entire world.
The same ethical and conservational efforts are being placed on the special exception of dumping waste water. The Monterey Bay Aquarium makes sure that the water they do discharge back into the bay does not contain “waste” persay.

Depending on where the water has been used or what the water has come into contact with (i.e. fish, birds, etc.) the water is treated with ultraviolet steralization and/or ozone treatments. These treatments deplete the amount of “waste” or probable toxins that could in fact harm marine organisms after being released back into the bay.

As of yet, the water has been sampled after being released back into the bay shows only slight amounts of copper and chlorine. Copper has been known to damage marine organisms’ gills, livers, kidneys, and nervous systems, while chlorine can be harmful to salmon and oysters. The aquarium insures that their waste water contains “very low levels” and there have been no toxicity effects noted.

While the board obviously supports the waste water ban being lifted, some California State University, Monterey Bay students consider the water discharge exemption to be somewhat of a contradiction. Mariel McCracken, sophomore and HCOM Major, stated “I think that’s absurd that they would put that much effort into the conservation of the bay, and then immediately pollute it once they feel they have “done their duty,” as far as preservation efforts go.”

After learning about the treatments the waste water goes through before being discharged, McCracken continued, “I’m guessing it is less expensive to dump into the ocean locally than to transport the waste to another facility. So, business-wise, for them, it is an excellent plan. Of course, if anything came back at a later time proving this was degrading the environment, then I would highly suggest they stop.”