LITTLE ROCK — Water quality changes for Big Creek and parts of Bayou DeView were approved Friday by the state Pollution Control and Ecology Commission, which granted an unopposed request by Jonesboro City Water and Light.
The utility asked the commission to increase the amounts of chlorides, sulfates and total dissolved solids - material left in the water after certain solids dissolve - allowed in the waterways so the company won’t fail to meet mineral standards implemented because the waterways have been listed on the state’s impaired water bodies list since 2008.
The list is compiled every two years and shows which lakes, rivers, creeks and streams have been harmed by such things as low oxygen levels, high sediment, high temperature, bacteria, phosphorus, beryllium, ammonia and chlorides. Bayou DeView is on the 2010 list as limited, a step down from impaired.
Arkansas has 11,900 miles of streams and monitors 9,787 of those miles.
The state’s 2010 impaired water-bodies list includes 3,732 miles of rivers and streams - or parts of about 300 waterways - meaning 38 percent of monitored waterways are impaired. That’s fewer miles than were reported to the EnvironmentalProtection Agency in 2008, when the state listed 4,086 impaired miles.
Jonesboro City Water and Light is held by the local improvement district and serves an area with more than 60,000 residents.
The utility’s statement of basis and purpose reads in part: “Because Bayou DeView below the mouth of Big Creek and Lost Creek is listed on the 2008 303(d) list as impaired, it is anticipated that City Water and Light’s renewal permit will, for the first time, contain effluent limitations for minerals.”
The unnamed tributary and Big Creek had chloride standards that allowed 48 milligrams per liter of the mineral in the water. That changes to 71 milligrams per liter in the unnamed tributary and 58 milligrams per liter for Big Creek. Both waterways also allowed for 37.3 milligrams per liter of sulfates, and thatstandard has changed to 60 milligrams per liter and 49 milligrams per liter, respectively. Total dissolved solids increase to 453 milligrams per liter from 411.3 for the tributary.
Bayou DeView’s standards change from 20 milligrams per liter for chlorides to 48 milligrams per liter; from 30 milligrams per liter to 37.3 milligrams per liter for sulfates; and from 270 milligrams per liter to 411.3 milligrams per liter for total dissolved solids.
Arkansas, Pages 15 on 09/25/2010