ILLINOIS POLLUTION CONTROL BOARD

March

6,

1975

NORTH SHORE SANITARY DISTRICT,

Petitioner,

v~

)

Respondent,

OPINION AND

ORDER OF THE BOARD

(by

Mr. Dumelle):

Petitioner, North Shore Sanitary

District

(NSSD),

filed

a Petition for Variance which was received by the Pollution

Control Board

(Board)

on November

6,

1974.

On November

8,

1974 the Board found the Petition to be inadequate and

ordered Petitioner to file an amended Petition,

The amended

Petition was received

by

the Board on December 12,

1974.

A

hearing was held on January

2,

1975 and the Environmental

Protection Agency filed a Recommendation in favor of granting

the Variance on January

9,

1975.

NSSD is a municipal corporation providing wastewater

treatment in the eastern portion of Lake County.

It has

begun construction of

a new sewage treatment plant in Gurnee,

which will discharge into the Des Plaines River.

It seeks a

Variance from Rule 404(f) (ii) of the Water Pollution Regulations

from October

1,

1975, when construction would be sufficiently

complete to provide secondary treatment

(and thus permit

start up of the plant operation)

until December 1,

1976,

At

that date tertiary treatment will become operative and BOD5

and suspended solids concentrations will be within the

levels established by Rule 404 (f) (ii)

.

Petitioner

expects

the secondary treatment to produce effluent at concentrations

of 2Omg/l

of

both BOD5 and

suspended solids. At

the hearing

NSSD contended that such a discharge will have no adverse

effect on

the

river and that water quality would not be

diminished,

It

submitted evidence claiming that the 1974

annual average for the whole

water course within its boundary

was

6

mg/l BOD5 and 85 mg/l total suspended solids. At the

testing station immediately upstream of the proposed outfall

16—21

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of the Gurnee plant these values were

4 mg/i and 78 mg/l,

respectively.

At the station immediately below the outfall

the values rose to

6 mg/i and 84 mg/i,

respectively.

Although NSSD admitted that effluent from its new Gurnee

plant would have “some effect of pollution” with regard to

suspended solids

(R.43)

it speculated that the BOD loading

(estimated at around 20 mg/i) would be more than compensated

for by additional oxygen provided by the increased flow.

As

the Agency offered no evidence to dispute this contention

we must rely on this testimony and conclude that a grant

of this Variance would not result in any significant

deterioration of the Des Plaines River.

The District’s

consulting engineer M.D.

R. Riddell also testified that the

dissolved oxygen standards of the Des Plaines River would

not be breeched

(R.

23).

NSSD also offered testimony at the hearing adequately

justifying the delay in completion of this project.

Delays

were attributed to

a concrete workers’ strike,

to a change

in the standards of Rule 404 (f) (ii)

brought about by the

Board’s regulatory hearings, R70-8,

in 1972, and to the

novelty of the project.

On October

1,

1975 the Gurnee Plant will accept effluent

from North Chicago, Great Lakes, Abbott Laboratories,

the

Village of Gurnee, and the upper Skokie Valley (consisting

of the area north of 12th Street in Chicago).

Flows

from

the first three are presently discharged into Lake Michigan.

Flows from Gurnee and the upper Skokie Valley are presently

treated at the Clavey Road sewage treatment plant.

It is

clear that

a grant of this variance will significantly

enhance the quality of Lake Michigan by removing the

residual phosphorus still contained in the effluent that

now goes

to the Lake.

It will also reduce the burden on

the Clavey Road plant.

At the same time it will result in

little or no detrimental effect on the water quality of the

Des Plaines River. We are hesitant however, considering the

early date by which this Petition was filed,

to grant the

variance for the full period of time desired by Petitioner.

We therefore grant the variance for the period October

1,

1975 until

a year from

today,

March 6

,

1976,

time,

Petitioner, North Shore Sanitary District,

Variance from Rule 404 (f) (ii)

of the Water Pollution Regula-

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—3—

tions for its Gurnee plant from October

1,

1975 until March

6,

1976 subject to the following conditions:

1.

Effluent from this plant

shal’l not exceed 20 and 25

mg/i of BOD5 and suspended solids respectively.

2.

Petitioner shall file monthly reports with the

Environmental Protection Agency during the course of this

Variance indicating the concentrations of BOD5 and suspended

solids in its effluent.

IT IS SO

ORDERED.

I, Christan L. Moffett, Clerk of the Illinois Pollution

Control Board, hereby cprtify the above Opinion and Order

were adopted on the

~

Illinois Pollution

Board

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