Wednesday Top of the Scroll: Bay Area households will pay $200 more per year to protect S.F. Bay
Bay Area cities and counties will soon have to make major upgrades to their aging wastewater facilities to comply with new regulations that aim to protect the San Francisco Bay from harmful algal blooms. The upgrades are estimated to cost $11 billion across the region — an average increase for ratepayers of $200 per year per household. The new regulations are expected to be finalized at Wednesday’s meeting of the San Francisco Bay Regional Water Quality Control Board. … The need for the upgrades became clear, regulators say, after major algal blooms in the bay over the past two summers turned the water rust red and killed tens of thousands of fish. Nutrients found in wastewater — especially nitrogen which comes from human urine and other types of waste — are major contributors to algal blooms. And algal blooms are more likely to happen as water temperatures and other conditions change in the bay with global warming.
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