Well Well Well

This opinion piece appeared in the Townsman, July 3, 2008 edition

Last week we discussed what you could do to replace your old home fuel oil tank, whether above or in ground. In a nutshell, if you don’t know how old your oil tank is, chances are it is time to REPLACE IT. If you don’t have the cash there is at least one local home fuel company that will perform the replacement and finance the cost over three years interest free. Believe me, you want to do it NOW.

With business out of the way, let’s parse the George (“Jerry”) Washington “Sub-Committee Report On Bearsville Area Fuel Tanks,” which was delivered to the Woodstock town board at its June 17 meeting under the imprimatur of councilman Jay Wenk.

Wenk, you recall, blasted the old town board for its “inaction,” and vowed if elected to rid the aquifer area of buried fuel tanks.

The opening sentence of the report reads; “The initial objective of the Jay Wenk Sub-Committee was to determine where fuel oil tanks were buried.”

Hate to quibble, but really what is of interest is where fuel oil tanks are buried. Many old tanks, in a sort of environmental Rapture, have left the ground over the years, and I can’t see the point in having them determined.

The report has some curiosities.

For one, on its data sheet it states, “13 Commercial buildings surveyed – None used Fuel Oil.” But, but… the Simulaids business (now moved to Saugerties), the single largest building in the area and the third largest in the town, unless they moved it with them has a 4000 gallon in-ground oil tank! How could Jay Wenk’s sub-committee have missed that? Anything (or anyone) else missing?

A third of the way down page 2 is a very sly addendum to Wenk’s “initial objective… to determine where fuel oil tanks were buried.” Without asking we are told, “During conversations with parcel owners, the topic of septic fields and potential public sewer connection were [sic] discussed. There were no indications that anyone was having septic tank or field problems [like they’d talk about it with representatives from the Town!] and there was a strong opposition to connecting to the town public sewer system.”

Three paragraphs later we are informed, “Septic system failure could affect the water quality of Wells 1 and 2 more so than Wells 3 thru 7. Septic contamination is not as disastrous as petroleum contamination and can be treated.”

Reading this you might think, oh heck, what’s a little salmonella or giardia in the water? As long as it’s not petroleum!

The purpose of this gratuitous addendum to Wenk’s report is to augment the paranoia some have toward the prospect of sending a sewer line up to the Bearsville development. Such a pipe, you see, would sprout Wal Marts, Burger Kings and a plethora of strip malls.

Washington, of course, has a history of disdaining sewer pipes. The hamlet sewer district arches around his property no less dramatically than Canada arches around Hudson Bay. Ask him why.

Now, point by point, a discussion of the Wenk/Washington report recommendations:

1) The recommendations restrict action to in-ground tanks. Big mistake. All oil tanks and the lines leading from them to the furnace are a potential disaster. Focusing on in-ground tanks could lull above ground tank owners into complacency.
2) The suggestion that the town board meet in executive session (that is, secretly) to discuss options and plans to eliminate in-ground tanks ignores the fact such a secret meeting would be illegal.
3) The suggestion to install monitoring wells on the perimeter of the “clustered tanks” can be improved by installing a monitoring well next to each in-ground tank. Why not know which tank is leaking? However, these monitoring wells are not cheap to install ($1500 a pop would not be unreasonable) nor is it cheap to analyze monitoring results (add a few hundred bucks more). Shouldn’t this money be used to remove the tanks?
4) Investigating the availability of devices attached to individual tanks that could indicate leakage would be a nice Wenk project. With the internet it should take him less time to investigate than it did to come up with and then write down the suggestion.
5) Engaging oil suppliers to alert the Town and customer of leaks, when the suppliers are already mandated to contact the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC) is superfluous.
6) Investigating financing the elimination of in-ground tanks with a funding plan is a splendid idea! And guess what; there is already at least one fuel company that offers interest-free financing over a three-year period. Been offering it for years. Again, such financing is available to owners of all oil tanks, above or in ground.
7) To drill the existing municipal wells deeper to a possible confined aquifer less susceptible to surface contamination was a recommendation made by New York State Rural Water Association several years ago to address the influence of surface water on the shallow municipal wells. Unless or until the Ulster County Health Department determines that the municipal wells are unacceptably influenced by surface water (primarily the Sawkill Stream) this is an unnecessary and expensive option. Much better would be the successful implementation of Wenk’s vow to rid the aquifer area of the potential for contamination by petroleum.

I quibble with Wenk/Washington’s gratuitous assertion that “Septic system failure could affect the water quality of Wells 1 and 2 more so than Wells 3 thru 7. Septic contamination is not as disastrous as petroleum contamination and can be treated.”

In 2003 the New York State Department of Health performed a source water assessment of Woodstock’s municipal water supply. The report states that all the municipal wells (clustered wells 1 and 2 are several hundreds of feet to the east of clustered wells 3, 4, 5, 6 and 7) have equal “high” susceptibility to enteric bacteria, enteric viruses and nitrates, which are products commonly generated by septic systems.

All the wells have equal “medium high” susceptibility to petroleum contamination.

If Wenk/Washington want to ignore that and revel in paranoid visions of Wal Mart, fine. But if we are really concerned with protecting the aquifer, and not just investigating means of continuing to get potable water in the event we pollute it, that sewer pipe needs to be considered and Wenk has to make a few more visits to the Bearsville neighborhood, hopefully with some home fuel company reps to offer their expertise and financial help with replacing oil tanks. Above ground and in ground.