Last summer, a smell compared to that of sulfur or raw sewage wafted through the air of Magnolia, leaving residents holding their noses as officials searched for a cause.
While many pointed to the West Point Treatment Plant as the source of the stench, a press release from the King County Wastewater Treatment Division that August indicated that it was low tides and decaying seaweed as the main cause.
A year later, some locals are again raising complaints about an aroma in the air. And again, fingers are being pointed at the treatment plant as the origin.
Stephanie Eberharter, a 25-year resident of the neighborhood, said she’s dealt with the smell every summer (particularly in August) for the last six to seven years, with no resolution.
“It goes on for maybe 40 minutes or so, and it’s much worse when it’s the tide coming in,” said Eberharter, who lives on Magnolia Boulevard, on the bluff overlooking the Puget Sound. “It’s on and off throughout the day.”
However, officials say that they haven’t heard nearly the number of grievances they did last year, if at all.
Seattle Public Utilities (SPU) spokesperson Andy Ryan said the agency hasn’t received any complaints in regard to odor in the vicinity of Magnolia Boulevard West and West Bertona Street, near Eberharter’s home. Outside of that general vicinity, he said, the utility has received a couple of calls regarding odor, but crews sent to those locations did not find problems related to SPU infrastructure.
Ryan said one of the main sources of a foul odor could be related to low tides.
“If it’s a big minus-tide, we get calls at that time of year, particularly if it’s hot,” Ryan said.
Unique conditions
Last September, SPU cleaned storm drains on 42nd and 44th avenues West in response to odor complaints. A dry, hot summer can contribute to odors from the sewer system, especially when there’s little to no stormwater coming through. Hand-in-hand with drier weather are lower water levels and slow flows, which allow more sulfur gases to build up inside pipes.
But Eberharter is convinced that the odor isn’t coming from directly below.
“This is not a smell that is out of the sewer,” Eberharter said. “This is raw sewage. Plain raw sewage.”
Annie Kolb-Nelson, a communications specialist for the King County Wastewater Treatment Division (WTD), said the treatment manager at West Point has not seen anything to indicate increased odors, and that everything is functioning normally.
All King County treatment facilities are equipped with odor-control systems.
“Those are carbon filters and pretty sophisticated air-quality, air-cleaning systems that keep nuisance odors at bay,” Kolb-Nelson said.
While Kolb-Nelson did not want to speculate on what could potentially cause an odor mistaken for one from the treatment plant, she noted that last year’s spike in calls — 10 in the month of August regarding West Point alone — was connected to an uncommon set of circumstances.
“That was related to some pretty unique conditions around the treatment plant,” she said.
In particular, the combination of low tides and decaying seaweed — which produces sulfur gases sporting an odor similar to that of sewage, according to the Washington State Department of Ecology — made for unpleasant scents wafting from Puget Sound beaches.
While low-level exposure to hydrogen sulfide — one of the gases produced by decaying seaweed — can cause eye, nose or throat irritation, contact with the gas at that concentration generally does not result in health problems.
Report any odors
Despite the lack of calls or complaints this year, Eberharter doesn’t think she is alone in her concerns.
“If you interviewed everyone in my neighborhood, they would tell you there’s a sewage smell,” Eberharter said.
To that end, she encourages other Magnolia residents to say something if they smell something.
“They need to be overwhelmed with people calling,” she said.
The WTD makes that same request, in an effort to be good neighbors to those living near its facilities.
Anyone wishing to report an odor or other problem they believe could be related to the West Point Treatment Plant is asked to call the 24-hour Odor Control Hotline at (206) 263-3801.
Residents are asked to report an odor — including the location and the time it occurred — as soon as possible, to allow the responding agency to take the proper corrective measures to get rid of it.
“If it is us,” Kolb-Nelson said, “we want to be able to correct it.”
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