[Rimarinefisheries] Conditional Area “A” closed at Noon today, January 2, 2019

[rimarinefisheries at listserve.ri.gov]

Earlier today DEM announced that Conditional Area “A” was closing at Noon today, January 2, 2019.  Enforcement officers were dispatched to notify harvesters.
The closure was required due to the discharge of 16.17 MG of partially treated combined sewage from the Bucklin Point Wet Weather Treatment Facility. In addition to the 1.2” rainfall criteria, Area “A” also closes whenever any of the following occur:
1) more than 0.5 million gallons of untreated combined sewage is discharged from the Bucklin Pt. North Diversion Structure or 0.5 million gallons of partially treated combined sewage is discharged from the Fields Point Wet Weather Facility;
2) the sum of these two discharges is more than 0.5 million gallons;
3) more than 14.5 million gallons of partially treated combined sewage is discharged from the Bucklin Point Wet Weather Facility, or
4) if the total volume from all three locations exceeds 14.5 million gallons.
These discharge related criteria have been in place for decades but usually rainfall amounts would cause a closure before the bypass criteria were exceeded.  Operation of the NBC CSO storage tunnel has allowed the rainfall trigger to be increased which may lead to instances of the rainfall trigger not being exceeded but discharge volumes causing a closure.
The DEM Office of Water Resources is working to re-evaluate whether the discharge volume triggers can be changed.

Area A is scheduled to re-open at noon, January 9, 2019 except for the emergency closure of the west side (Conimicut Pt to Ogden Ave.) which will remain closed until further notice. The 222-2900 hotline has been updated.



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