Wildfires, Safety, and Water Quality: After the Smoke Clears
By Allison Lukens, EI, Mead & Hunt, Inc.

If you live in the Western part of the United States, chances are you were impacted by the historic wildfire season in 2020. A total of 10.27 million acres and nearly 59,000 fires burned last year, contributing to the largest annual wildfire acreage burned in the U.S. since 1960. Although it’s difficult to predict the precise time, location, and magnitude of wildfires, we need to accept that they are a possibility and do whatever we can to prepare for them. 

New Stormwater Management Strategies and Benefits During These Unusual Times

Community leaders continue to be pressed to determine essential services and define the critical activities to operate safely and continuously in their communities. The need for clean, safe, and reliable drinking water is high on that list, as well as the need for functioning wastewater collection and treatment systems. With tight budgets and little time, these leaders find themselves asking critical questions: What level of functionality of stormwater infrastructure is essential? Can we wait to perform some of these functions when things are safer? What activities are truly essential?

The vitality of stormwater infrastructure is necessary to protect our urban areas during storms and prevent pollutants from entering our waterways. We increasingly rely on green infrastructure to better manage stormwater, deliver water quality benefits, enhance the appearance of urban areas, and make movement safer for pedestrians and bicycles.

Thornton Creek is familiar to you as the 18-mile urban creek that runs from Southeast Shoreline through to Northeast Seattle. The creek has been manipulated extensively over the past decades as it was solely a flood conveyance system for the area; however, from these alterations, it became less hospitable for the fish and wildlife. For the fish to thrive, the water layers need to interact in a cyclical habitat, which cleanses the water of waste and regulates the temperature of the water.

Seattle Public Utilities took notice of this issue and evaluated the creek from surface to bottom. The restoration began with Xylem Rental Solutions to dewater the entire site, while the fish were moved temporarily by Seattle Pacific University biologists. This whole restoration effort took four years and cost around $11 million; in the beginning, a major storm threatened the initial progress and two Godwin pumps were used to save the project site.

On July 16, the House passed HR 3906, the Innovative Stormwater Infrastructure Act of 2017, a bill introduced by Rep. Denny Heck (R-WA), by voice vote.  This is legislative language that the Water Environment Federation (WEF) and the National Municipal Stormwater Association (NMSA), as part of their partnership in the WEF Stormwater Institute, supported and advocated for, which would create a task force that would look for ways to fund our nation’s stormwater infrastructure needs.  Read more.

WIFIA-financed King County, Wash., stormwater treatment project to protect water quality in the Duwamish River

Construction is underway in the Georgetown neighborhood of Seattle, Wash., on a combined sewer overflow (CSO) wet weather treatment station that will treat up to 265 million L/d (70 mgd) of polluted stormwater runoff that currently can flow into the Duwamish River during severe rain events. The $262 million Georgetown Wet Weather Treatment Station — a key part of King County’s broader objective to safeguard Puget Sound — is expected to help protect the Duwamish River from stormwater pollution for the next century.