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WMSC
ASTEWATER ANAGEMENT TEERING OMMITTEE
Minutes of February 3, 2005
A meeting of the Wastewater Management Steering Committee was called to order at 10:00 a.m. in
Members Present:
Meeting Room A, Orleans Town Hall. Augusta McKusick (Board of Health); Ann
Hodgkinson (Board of Water Commissioners); John Hinckley (Board of Selectmen); Judith Bruce
(Conservation Commission); Yoshio Inomata (Finance Committee); Sims McGrath (Planning Board);
Also Present:
George Meservey (Planning Director); Michael Giggey (Wright-Pierce); Dr. Brian Howes
(SMAST); Mark Nelson (Horsley & Witten); John Hodgkinson and other members of the Citizen's
Advisory Committee, Jay Burgess (Tri-Town Plant).
APPROVAL OF MINUTES:
MOTION: Sims McGrathAnn Hodgkinson
On a motion by , seconded by , the Committee voted to
approve the minutes of January 20, 2005.
VOTE: 4-0-1 The vote passed by a majority
. (Judith Bruce abstained).
OLD BUSINESS
Committee Reports
Board of Selectmen
– Hinckley stated there was a discussion regarding the future costs for testing and
where it should come from in the budget. Because it is level funded, Hinckley said he asked the Board of
Selectmen to solicit information from Wastewater Management Steering Committee and the Water
Quality Task Force.
McKusick said the Wastewater Management Steering Committee is very close to having a report for the
Board of Selectmen. There are three issues that need to be reported. The first issue is the final Horsley &
Witten report. The Wastewater Management Steering Committee will read the report and write up
recommendations. The second issue is to complete the Tri-Town Report. The committee will make
recommendations and have a dialogue with the Board of Selectmen. McKusick expressed concern about
moving up the Village Center Plan on the Capital Improvements Plan at the expense of the
Comprehensive Wastewater Management Plan funding. McKusick stated these two projects are
integrated.
Planning Board
– McGrath stated the Planning Board’s objective is to justify the need to change the
scheduling in the Capital Improvement Plan. The Planning Board feels that it is very important that the
Comprehensive Wastewater Management Plan and the Village Center Plan be parallel.
NEW BUSINESS
Presentation by Mike Giggey (Wright-Pierce)
McKusick stated that the County, through extra funding, at the direction of the Natural Resources
Committee and advice from WIC has awarded a grant for $50,000 to the Town of Orleans to do a study of
the Tri-Town area. Wright-Pierce was hired to do the study and is present to give a progress report.
Wastewater Management Steering Committee Minutes – February 3, 2004 Page 1
Giggey told the committee that the County is sponsoring a program for the US Geological
Survey (USGS) to provide modeling services to each of the towns that ask for it. USGS has developed a
pretty sophisticated Cape-wide groundwater model. That model is the basis for the delineation of
watersheds and determining the direction groundwater is flowing. Giggey said that Wright-Pierce’s job
was to go to USGS and ask about taking the model and applying it to the Tri-Town to help answer
questions. The four things that limit additional effluent disposal to the Tri-Town site: 1) It has to get into
the ground. Geometrically, how much can you fit on this site and on some key adjacent sites. There is a
limitation in the number of square feet available. 2) Once you apply the effluent, will the groundwater, as
a result of the application, mound up. If it mounds up and gets within four feet of the ground surface that
might limit the amount you could apply. 3) If that application occurs in this location, where is the plume
going to go? Is it going to continue to go where the Tri-Town plume is now going? Might it go
somewhere to the south toward Hurley’s Bog? Might the application of a large amount of wastewater this
close to the divide between the Namskaket creek watershed and the Town Cove watershed shift the
boundary between the two watersheds? 4) Once the contaminants, the nitrates in particular, that the
plume might carry, get to a receiving water, what are the impacts?
The model that USGS has developed is coarse-grained. The computer model is a mathematical model
that predicts groundwater flow among various nodes. The node spacing for that model is 400 feet.
Giggey stated that Don Walter, the modeler from the Cape-wide work, and Peter Weiskell, USGS, found
there is a downward trending clay layer going towards the marsh. It is tight clay. The plume is in the
shape of a mitten. The thumb of the plume may be 20%+ of the contaminants and flow and the hand of
the plume is the 80%. These are very rough numbers. USGS is finding that the thumb of the plume may
be above that clay layer and that portion of the plume may be coming up into Namskaket Creek. It hasn’t
reached there yet, but it appears to be going in that direction. The good news is that the hand of the plume
is underneath the clay and may actually bypass Namskaket Creek and may end up in Cape Cod Bay. It is
good news with respect to environmental impact, but there are a lot of question marks associated with it.
They have done a lot of detail work on the Tri-Town site near the bike path, but have much less
knowledge as you go beyond.
Meservey asked if USGS has the capacity to reduce the pixel size for a specific location if there was
enough money to put into that model. Giggey stated USGS is the correct agency but it is not in the
budget. Giggey stated he has informally asked Peter Weiskell to start to think about the cost to take the
specific information he has and come up with either a variation of the broad model or a specific model.
Meservey asked what level of detail DEP would require before they would consider allowing any
expanded septage treatment here. Giggey responded that when the Tri-Town system was built, GZA did
some modeling and some detailed studies at that site and should you choose to do an expanded septage
facility at Tri-Town or try to bring in effluent disposal from another source, there is a project specific
hydro geological evaluation that would be required, some of it would be done with the Comprehensive
Wastewater Management Plan and some of it would be done in the next phase of the project.
Giggey reiterated that there are four things to worry about – geometry, mounding, direction of plume and
impact of the receiving water.
Giggey stated GZA has done work that indicates if ½ million gallons of wastewater were disposed of
here, it appears that the mound might be on the order of 8 feet or less and there is sufficient depth to
groundwater at this site, so that is a very good answer. The total depth to groundwater is 40+ unsaturated
zone. If it is 30 or 40 feet and all we are going to encroach is 8 feet into it, that is pretty good news.
Wastewater Management Steering Committee Minutes – February 3, 2004 Page 2
Giggey told the committee that an important component of the Comprehensive Wastewater Management
Plan is looking at sites.
Dr. Brian Howes asked if it is possible to determine where the increased discharge is going to come out.
Giggey responded that using the mitten analogy, the hand of the mitten is underneath the clay layer and
Peter Weiskell is unable to say for sure whether that which is under the clay layer, some of it may come
out in the Namskaket Creek Marsh, some of it may come out in Cape Cod Bay and some of it may come
out in other watersheds. He doesn’t have enough information to say for sure where it is going to come
out.
Dr. Howes stated that in mapping that area, it was hard to tell if the clay layer was continuous or
discontinuous. There is a need for increased modeling to predict discharge due to mounding. The
concern for many years has been trying to figure out if it dives under the clay, then a model won’t tell you
about that stratigraphy and unless that is part of it, it’s not clear that modeling alone will get you there.
But it will tell you if it goes to Hurley’s Bog. This is a good site to look at. The subsurface investigation
is mapping this clay layer.
Dr. Howes said there is going to have to be some nitrogen removal in the upper part of Pleasant Bay.
Presentation by Dr. Brian Howes - Massachusetts Estuaries Project (MEP)
McKusick told the Wastewater Management Steering Committee that Citizen's Advisory Committee
members have done a survey in town on lawn fertilizers and grass samples, and Brian Howes was present
to give a final report on the findings.
Dr. Brian Howes (SMAST) explained that this is an estuaries project report prepared by SMAST. The
report contains not just the synthesized data but also includes a compilation of all the raw data and quality
assurance in the back. The front of the report is how it fits into planning. This is a draft final report dated
February 2005.
Dr. Howes gave a powerpoint presentation entitled, “Watershed Nitrogen Loading from Lawn Fertilizer
Applications within the Town of Orleans, Massachusetts”.
Mark Nelson – Horsley & Witten
Mark Nelson gave out copies of their final report. The committee will take up review at its next meeting.
The meeting adjourned at 12:15 p.m.
Respectfully submitted,
Karen C. Sharpless, Recording Secretary
Wastewater Management Steering Committee Minutes – February 3, 2004 Page 3