Washington’s Snowmageddon offers D.C. residents a rare opportunity to experience the real-world effects of environmental policies that don’t make any sense.
For instance, in years past, excess snow plowed off the local roads was loaded into trucks was then dumped into the Potomac River. It was an easy, cheap way to get rid of tons of the white stuff. But the District no longer does that because environmentalists complained that the road salt was fouling the river.
Never mind that, like CO2, salt is a natural substance. It’s obviously not a good idea to dump large quantities into the river. But surely the enormous amount of snow mixed in with it during our once-in-a-hundred-years snowfall this past weekwould dilute it enough so it would not cause any lasting damage.
Like a quarter of its snow plows, the city’s snow melter is on the fritz. But instead of dumping snow right into the river, D.C. director of public works William Howland ordered road crews to build a snow mountain along the banks of the Anacostia, where it will eventually melt and run off into the Potomac tributary – salt and all – and quickly make its way into the main river channel.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704182004575055601529152426.html?mod=WSJ-hpp-LEFTTopStories
Does this make any sense?
The irony is that during periods of excessive rainfall, local wastewater treatment plants – including the District’s Blue Plains facility – routinely dump raw sewerage into the river for the same reason: it’s sufficiently diluted not to pose a significant environmental problem. If raw sewerage can occasionally be dumped into the river to no ill effect, why can’t snow – which is so much cleaner by comparison?
Just asking.
