J.T. Morgan, who lives along the Blanco River on Lost Acres Loop south of FM 165 bridge crossing, says he saw the beginnings of an algae bloom there two weeks ago that has blossomed into a cover of slime. He submitted the photo at top right to the Blanco County News Thursday, March 21.

He contends that the algae is a result of discharge from the city of Blanco’s wastewater treatment plant just upstream.

Morgan is president of Protect Our Blanco, a coalition opposed to the city of Blanco’s discharge permit application to the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality (TCEQ) that would increase the city’s legal discharge of treated wastewater from 225,000 gallons per day to 1.6 million gallons.

The city has maintained a discharge permit into the Blanco River since 1965. The city’s wastewater treatment facility is located at 289 Waters Edge Road. Treated water from the facility enters the Blanco River approximately 2,000 feet, or two channel dams, upstream of the FM 165 bridge crossing.

“The first bloom I noticed was two weeks ago downstream, between Tejas Trail and the Blanco Settlement RV Park,” Morgan said. “The algae starts at the dump point. If you walk upstream, you don’t see it.”

Morgan says the algae is different than anything he’s ever seen on the river.

“Volume makes this algae different,” he said. “I don’t think you could walk through this. It drops off that dam, and now you can’t see any water. It’s 8 to 10 inches deep. It’s a lot worse there now than I’ve ever seen, and I’ve been here since 2011.”

He also contends that the city has been dumping wastewater into the river for weeks.

“Obviously, folks are upset,” Morgan said. “We have filed complaints with the TCEQ and Guadalupe Blanco River Authority.”

He is also concerned about water quality.

“Under the Freedom of Information Act I’ve asked the city for quality of water reports on nitrogen, plastics, phosphorus and hormones and all I got was the quantity of water,” Morgan said. “I’m guessing the city doesn’t have records of the quality of water.”

Mayor Martha Herden says the algae is a natural occurrence, including at the FM 165 dam and crossing, and confirmed that the city is continually testing the effluent produced by the wastewater treatment plant.

“We see algae blooms like this normally this time of year and in this location,” she said. “We were so concerned about similar algae growth there last year that we had the water tested and impact to the aquatic life in the river studied. The state didn’t mandate the testing of the river, we invested in a very expensive independent study to ensure it wasn’t a result of discharge.”

She cites a report conducted by Integrated Environmental Solutions, located in McKinney, which released its report March 13, 2018.

“The city hired a firm to conduct an independent water quality investigation along the river in February 2018 when the spring algae bloom hit,” Mayor Herden said. “This was during an extended period when the city was not releasing water from the wastewater treatment facility into the Blanco River.”

The report concluded:

“As outlined in the report, the nutrient loads in all sampled segments of the river were well below the EPA and TCEQ recreational water quality standards. The segments below the wastewater treatment facilities effluent discharge channel actually tested lower than the segments upstream. Based on our sampling there does not appear to be any excess nutrient loading in the river caused by the waste water treatment facility’s effluent discharge channel or irrigation fields. The algae bloom does not appear to be affecting the aquatic life within the segments where the algae were found.”

City Utilities Director Ronnie Rodriguez says he is seeing algae blooms in other locations upstream on the river, including the spring at Lindeman Lane, just before the FM 165 bridge.

“The little spring at Lindeman Lane that flows into the river on the other side from the FM 165 dam is full of algae and it doesn’t get water from the wastewater treatment plant,” he said. “There is also algae at Hinds Branch and other creeks that flow into the river several miles upstream. We are also treating water from the river at the city water treatment plant for significant levels of pollen right now that contribute to algae growth.”

According to Ron Fieseler, general manager of the Blanco-Pedernales Groundwater Conservation District, algae blooms are common occurrences in the spring caused by a combination of factors.

“We haven’t had much rain, so you’ve got slow-moving and shallow water,” he said. “The days are longer, there is more sunlight and the weather is warming significantly. And then there are the high levels of pollen. A combination of all of these things leads to algae growth.”

He also cited the concrete dam and banks at the FM 165 dam and crossing as providing more surface area for the algae roots to lodge than limestone that is polished by water flow over time, and why areas downstream from the FM 165 dam, such as the crossing on Tejas Trail, have no algae problems currently.

“You also have spring fertilization in lawns and by agriculture that contributes,” he said. “Soil erosion from the heavy rains last fall left organic matter in the water. Even the minnows and fish spawning in the spring increases organic matter that combined with sunlight and the warmth can fuel algae growth.”

Fieseler noted that other shallow streams are facing similar common algae outbreaks.

“If you look at the Miller Creek dam right now, the top of it is covered with algae,” he said. “There is no municipal effluent flowing down that creek.”

Rodriguez agrees that even mulch, fecal matter and the organic carbon from burned fields can contribute to algae growth.

Mayor Herden said the city has been discharging treated water into the Blanco River since the new wastewater treatment facility was placed into operation in November 2018. Saturated conditions on the city’s irrigation fields due to high rainfall have limited the city’s ability to irrigate the treated water.

“The city of Blanco is pro-irrigation,” Mayor Herden said. “If the city had its way, we would never discharge in the river.”

She says that commitment to irrigation began years ago. The city originally owned only 12 acres, but in 1981 purchased another 110 acres for irrigation.

Regarding the charges levied by Morgan that city probably isn’t testing the water, Rodriguez reports that he and three licensed waste water operators analyze the effluent water daily and sample the water on a weekly basis, as required by TCEQ.

“We’re staffing the plant 24 hours a day and have a continuous monitoring center with a backup generator,” he said. “The test results show we’re doing better than TCEQ requirements. It is in our best interest to make the best water we can.”

He said the new facility is operating at an average daily flow of approximately 130,000 gallons per day and is removing Biochemical Oxygen Demand (BOD), Total Suspended Solids (TSS), Ammonia Nitrogen, Phosphorus and E. Coli to the required TCEQ levels.

“What people need to understand is that this new wastewater treatment plant is so much more efficient and enhances our capabilities to reduce the amount of phosphorus discharged,” Mayor Herden said.

“For the past two or three months, the new facility has successfully removed approximately 90 percent of the phosphorus received in the raw wastewater stream, which is known to contribute to the algae growth witnessed along the river,” Rodriguez said.

“This is the first time in the city’s history that it has had the capability to remove phosphorus from the treated water,” Mayor Herden said. “The city’s goal is to remove more than 99 percent of the phosphorus received in the raw wastewater stream.”

In addition, every year the city takes five different soil samples on the primary area where irrigation occurs and reports this information to TCEQ.

The Groundwater Conservation District also performs annual testing of water quality and submits its results to the Texas Water Development Board.

“Every summer we check the groundwater,” Fieseler said. “We sample for 35 different constituents and the vast majority come back below detection level. Since 2003, we have taken water samples and we haven’t found any evidence that the groundwater has suffered from effluent discharge. The district has nothing actionable or proof that the groundwater quality has been affected.”

Johnson City also has a discharge permit of 303,000 gallons per day into the Pedernales River. That permit is currently up for review.

“From the outside view, it is easy to say the city isn’t doing anything,” Mayor Herden said. “And that is just not true. The city has invested more than $6 million to replace our aging infrastructure and in ongoing improvements to the wastewater treatment facility. The city will continue to work diligently to improve operations and the quality of water discharged from the new wastewater treatment facility, including expanding reuse and other alternatives to meet the water resource needs of Blanco.”