The warning signs didn’t come from inside the plant—they came from the water itself.
Routine monitoring by Blue Water Baltimore detected high bacteria levels outside the Patapsco Wastewater Treatment Plant, signaling that something was going wrong deep inside the system, says Alice Volpitta, Baltimore Harbor Waterkeeper.
It turns out there were cascading failures across the treatment train at that facility and the nearby Back River facility, allowing partially treated effluent to reach local waterways and raising serious public health concerns.
Together these two failing wastewater treatment plants were responsible for roughly 2 million pounds of nitrogen pollution—more than all other treatment plants in Maryland combined, says David Reed of the Chesapeake Legal Alliance.
As this story shows, consistent monitoring, transparency, and enforcement can turn hidden failures into accountability—and force long-overdue fixes.
Episode at https://bit.ly/LawsChesapeake
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