Sunday, July 16, 2000
Water program trudges through
options for sludge
By Samuel Segrist
Reporter-News Staff Writer
Figuring out what to do with what’s
left over after the water is taken out of sewage depends largely
on whether anybody is willing to do anything with it.
For those who don’t mind, there are
options.
“People do all kinds of creative things
with sludge,” said Dwayne Hargesheimer, Abilene water director.
Solids typically account for only 1 percent
of wastewater. Abilene has a sludge disposal pond into which it
pumps its solids. Some farmers and ranchers take certain types
of the sludge and haul it off, free of charge.
In its liquid form, sludge can be loaded
into a truck tank and sprayed onto pastures as a fertilizer. Solid,
dry forms are used in a similar way.
Beginning in 1992, far West Texas became
one of the nation’s biggest recipients of sludge. In a program
that had neighbors screaming, New York put its dry waste on a
train car and hauled it to a ranch near Sierra Blanca.
Over six years, 240,000 tons of dry sludge
made its way from the Big Apple to the ranch. In response to the
program, the state passed restrictive waste disposal guidelines
in an effort to calm fears that the sludge would drain into the
area’s waterways.
But Hargesheimer said things seemed to go
well.
“The grass was 8 inches higher where
they had put it,” he said.
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Abilene Reporter-News / Texnews / E.W. Scripps Publications
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