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Morro Bay sewage facility may move to site of power plant

November 12, 2013

morro bay stacksThe Morro Bay Public Works Department has issued a report recommending moving the city’s sewage treatment facility to the location of the closing Morro Bay Power Plant.

The report examines seven possible locations for the new sewage plant ranging in cost from $90 million to $160 million. Morro Bay jointly operates the sewage plant with the Cayucos Sanitation District.

The plant is currently located near the beach at the end of Atascadero Road. In 2003, the Central Coast Regional Water Quality Control Board ordered Morro Bay and Cayucos to upgrade the plant. Last year, the California Coastal Commission said it wanted to move the plant one mile from the coastline.

The location proposed by public works staff is a 12-acre site at the south end of Morro Bay Power Plant by Highway 1. The power plant will close in February after 50 years of operation.

Building the sewage facility at the power plant will cost an estimated $90 million, which is the cheapest of the seven options considered.

The previous Morro Bay City Council did not support moving the plant due to the cost and suggested doing so might double sewer rates. It would have cost an estimated $60 million to upgrade the plant at its current location.

Following the November 2012 election, the board majority flipped from one that opposed moving the sewage plant to one that supported the move.

After the election, the majority also swung in opposition to City Attorney Rob Scultz and City Manager Andrea Lueker. The council is currently in the process of firing Schultz and considering firing Lueker.

A review of the employment status of both Schultz and Lueker is on the closed session agenda for Tuesday’s council meeting. A discussion of the sewage plant location will follow during the regularly scheduled meeting.

 


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What a joke! A sewage treatment plant at the Morrow Bay power plant?


It might be the cheapest option on paper, strictly looking at direct construction expenses, but I doubt anyone is seriously thinking its going to happen.


I think its an intended waste of everyone’s attention just to say the project is going to be more expensive and for staff to say we provided the options for the one idiot who thinks its a great idea.


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This is a big mistake for the rate payers. The cost to retrofit as well as the future liabilities that come with owning the stacks puts the cost in the lap of the residents, a lofty scam.


Then again, Morro Bay Oysters may get real fat and become a boom that local industry.


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Will the council be relocating their offices to the same facilities, as well? Then they could sell their buildings and offset any costs…


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What would be the cost to acquire the plant, remediate the environmental issues, and build the plant? The cleanup will make this cost prohibitive, but, our Mayor likes expensive.


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Hmm….the current plants dependency on ocean water for cooling, kills sea life through entrainment and when the proposed sewer plant spills (they ALL do according the Los Osos opponents) is sea life going to be affected?

Wouldn’t most consider this site to be “in the center of town?” (Again the Los Osos argument)

Interesting times….


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So?


There’s nothing necessarily wrong with using ocean water for cooling. There’s also nothing necessarily wrong with “once through cooling.”


Please quantify your “kills sea life through entrapment” and the ACTUAL impact it has on the local community (and not a small patch of the Pacific Ocean) yesterday, today and tomorrow. The plant has been operating for over 50 years. Surely there is plenty of data to report and plenty of data to project from.


Attacking this power plant based on “kills sea life through entrapment” crap rather than the actual impact it has to the community is reprehensible.


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I was being facetious. Entrainment was the word of the day when CAPE helped kill any chances of the power plant being upgraded. I find it ironic that now the power plant is being considered for a sewage treatment plant. Many members who opposed the Los Osos sewer plant because of it’s once proposed location (TRI-W), and who opposed the upgrade of the Morro Bay power plant, somehow think it’s a good location for a sewer plant.

Collectively, a relatively small group has ensured that Morro Bay is no longer a thriving commercial fishing port, or a power generating entity.

The only thing being entrained these days are the citizens of Morro Bay.

RECALL THE MAYOR


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This is a joke right? I have no problem with the existing use of the power plant as it has been there and the people who where around in the fifties didn’t have a problem with it.

BUT now that the plant could be mothballed, if it is torn down, then it would be wise to pursue other uses in that immediate area.


Why (pardon the pun) stir the pot. Putting a sewage treatment plant down on the embarcadero by all the restaurants? I live in Paso and I can tell you when you go by the plant north of 24th street, there are days in the immediate vicinity that leaves you wanting to leave the area.


Again I have no problem with the plant but if this chapter is coming to a close and as long as they (Duke Energy) aren’t forced to do something and willing sell, then this is the time to move to other appropriate uses fit to that area.


Can you imagine driving to the rock and right by the collection ponds? Again this has to be a joke because I think people on both sides of this present issue would agree that the idea is preposterous!!


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Go to the city web site and read the report. The sewer plant would not be on the Embarcadero. The portion of the site they are looking at is on the south east side next to Scott street. Several of the neighbors on Scott street would be minimally affected, according to the report.


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Minimumly affected if you don’t live on Scott Street. It also looks to me that Scott St is less than 1000 feet from the Embarcadero I would say there would be some impact there as well.


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What I am saying is go read the report and make up your own mind. If I lived on Scott street I would be concerned also.


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I was being sarcastic toward the preparer of the report, not you. I understood from your post that you were referring to the report. Sorry if I came across differently.


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My bad. It is about five hundred feet further to the south. Yea I don’t think the smell willdrift to the embarcadero from there.


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Sewer plants built with the old, outdated technology definitely smell awful and do not belong near homes, businesses or restaurants, but plants built with some of the modern technologies look and smell like ordinary office buildings.


There is one – I think it is in Arizona – that is next to a golf course, and for some time after it was built, visitors kept coming into the building thinking it was the golf course office. Nobody would make that mistake with our current, horrendously-stinky plant.


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And a new and state of the art Water Treatment Plant can be built at the existing site. No need to put it in a prime tourist area affecting thousands. Golf Courses are often built on land unusable for other purposes. (flood zones, etc) Other interests often don’t build nearby due to those factors. It would be great to replace our current, Horrendously-Stinky Mayor.


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No, it cannot. Get it through your head. The CCC will not allow a new plant at the existing site.


As for the mayor, it is clear that some of the posters here are members of the small old boy/old girl network minority that has, for many years, controlled Morro Bay to the detriment of the majority of residents. Certain members of the staff did their bidding and it has nearly destroyed the town. Laws were repeatedly broken and many good people were bullied and harassed when they did not want to go along with the corrupt agenda of the network.


Finally, we have a Council majority that is ethical, honest, and dedicated to serving the majority – the good and ethical citizens who want our town to be run honestly and fairly. Network members don’t understand such concepts, but it would be a good idea for them to make an effort to do so


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I forget, which one are we getting in Los Osos? Oh yeah, the stinky one.


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There is a sewage plant right next to I5 in Carlsbad. It’s completely covered and looks like an industrial park. You wouldn’t know it is there except I lived there when it was built years ago


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If the majority of the sewage plant could be constructed inside the existing building, with a park like setting outside, irrigated with reclaimed water meeting Title 22 requirements for unrestricted use, it seems like an idea worth looking into.


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I have it on very good authority that the Mayor and board majority are not interested in having the sewer on the plant site. If you read the report, the site would work very well and would be shielded from almost all views. The biggest problems with site that the report highlights is political.


It’s not going to happen, so the second cheapest option (the cheapest is to leave it where it is) is off the table.


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The clean up of that site may make it less affordable than you think unless you could manage to get Dynergy to clean it up.


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I guess with the Electric plant closing, they’ll just give property to MB to build a sewer plant on,that will be a cold day,I’m sure the residents that live right next to that 12 acre parcel want to have the sewer plant there with the wonderful aroma reminding them what part of town they live in.


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That is a problem with any of the alternate sites, property owners will sue to keep it away diminishing property values.


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