Upper Bear Creek Community Council: June 25, 2002 Woodinville Library

Attending were: Mary Filkins, Pat and Bob McCormick, Mary Kuehn, Geoff Clayton Marissa Alegria and Nancy Stafford

The agenda was followed with the addition of another building permit application to expand a church, at 13940 NE 166th St Woodinville.

Gunars Sreibers, manager of Conveyance for Wastewater Treatment on the Brightwater project spoke about the current "scoping process" that runs thru June 27, seeking public input. This will be used for Environmental Impact Statement to be in draft form for public comment in October 2002. The final EIS is due May 2003. Construction 2005-2010 when the plant will be in operation. See handout on Determination of Significance and Scoping Notice Two sites to be examined, Edmonds Unocal with 14 miles of conveyance at a cost of $1Billion and Rt. 9 with 23 miles of conveyance at a cost of $1.3 Billion dollars. The Unocal site requires 4 different pipelines, Rt. 9, 6 lines. Use of gravity to move the water will be used to save energy wherever possible. Studies attempt to define impact of construction on community, traffic, noise, dust, odor etc. and impact of facility once it's up and running. Brightwater will be a relatively small facility, initially handling 36 million gallons of wastewater a day with plans for 54 mgd by 2040. We were assured that the plant would have the best odor control available; there should be no odor from Brightwater perceived by surrounding residents. He said the many small tribs east of Little Bear Creek would be routed thru the north portion of the property, away from current pollutants, and the water quality would be improved by this action. Either of the proposed plants will serve Snohomish Co. (64%) from Paine Field south and the northwestern portion of King Co. (Shoreline, Kenmore, Bothell, Woodinville). Rt. 9 is favored by the potential of re-use water needs closely. It's easier to reclaim water for human consumption than to provide treated wastewater for fish in our waterways. Wastewater will not flow directly into the Samm. Slough but it can be used for irrigation of turf farms, growing fields and golf courses….some of whom currently reduce flows in the Samm. Slough by pumping out of it for irrigation. Estimates of 3-5 mgd of reuse water would be available. The treatment process was explained. After treatment, solids are shipped to eastern Wa.
Where Weyhouser uses 25% for growing trees and the remaining 75 % is used by farmers as fertilizer, waste water is sent into Puget sound through pipes extending 3-5 thousand feet offshore at a depth of 5-600 feet to mix 1000 to 1 with saltwater currents there. Treatment plants have multiple power sources as "fail-safe" protection. King Co has 273 miles of 56" to 144" diameter pipe that has suffered no earthquake damage since 1958. King Co owns and maintains conveyance pipes. They contract services with various water districts owning and maintaining water and sewer system services. Mr Sreibers urged us all to send responses in by the June 27 target date and said comments received after that will be considered as well. He noted that the public has little awareness of the power they can exert on these decisions. May 2003, Ron Sims will announce the final choice as King Co Executive.

Next UBCC meeting July 9 7:30 at Nancy's house.