The lights never go off in the slightly stinky laboratory at the Moccasin Bend Wastewater Treatment Plant.

Twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week, 365 days a year, a team of lab technicians braves the sight and smell of millions of gallons of human waste to make sure nothing is getting back into the Tennessee River that shouldn’t.

“All the time, we’re looking to see if there are any violations,” said Paul Patterson, manager of laboratory services at the plant, which runs three shifts so as not to let any excess ammonia, nitrogen, phosphorus or E. coli bacteria slip by.

But the team doesn’t test for any pharmaceuticals. They don’t need to, according to Jerry Stewart, director of Chattanooga’s waste resources division. Neither the Tennessee Department of Environment and Conservation nor the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency requires any screening for drugs in the water, Mr. Stewart said, because neither agency has determined the levels safe for humans or wildlife.

And on top of that, he added, there’s no point – because the current wastewater treatment system in Chattanooga couldn’t filter those things out anyway.

New technology has made it possible for scientists to determine that people are excreting unused portions of the medications they’re taking back into the nation’s water supply. University of Tennessee at Chattanooga professors Sean Richards and Steven Symes have detected traces of 13 common drugs in the Tennessee River, including caffeine and various antibiotics and antidepressants.

But the water treatment industry hasn’t quite caught up to the science, Mr. Stewart said.

“The city has been proactive about getting ahead of the enforcement curve. We’re doing all we have to be doing,” he said.

Chattanooga is in line with all required environmental regulations on water treatment, “but our sewer system dates back to 1890,” he said.

Full story and video at: http://timesfreepress.com/news/2008/sep/08/
chattanooga-science-flows-ahead-cure/?local