ArkieGold
User
A Juvenile Earthworm
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Re:Is it in the worms? - 2009/05/03 22:44
Actually everyone should be concerned if worms are ingesting medications. If they are, then it's a sure sign the medications are entering water sources. The whole purpose of PyroMed is to keep medications out of the waste stream and ultimately out of the water and in the soil. The mentioned furnace provides a complete as possible clean burn. Open barrels are illegal for that very reason and should be stopped by all law officials or otherwise.
Sadly though, as sure as there is sludge from wastewater, there is going to be medications and a host of other chemicals in it. What are we to do with sewer sludge? Often it is too toxic to landfill. We can't store it or burn it.
Thermophilic composting seems to be a somewhat viable metod of destruction of pathogens but evidence shows it is not 100% effective.
Vermiculture also shows promise in reduction of pathogens in sludge in EPA pilot programs and worms are being used to reclaim heavily toxic soils in India and other countries from heavy metals and industrial chemicals.
Due to variances in waste streams, there is no "one" method that is acceptable. One city will have a whole different set of substances to deal with than the next. All I can do is work with what I have to deal with and hope vermiculture in conjunction with thermophilic composting will produce a clean casting and hopefully be a model for other wastewater systems. A full analysis is being done on our sludge at this time. Another will be performed in the future after our project processes are performed.
Be it drug residues or just plain bad bacteria, as long as we are eating, defecating and flushing, sewer sludge is a problem we are going to have to figure out how to reduce and reuse or we will effectively destroy ourselves with our own wastes.
Who is to blame? Everyone and nobody. We just messed up a long time ago and figured the best way to treat our wastes was with miles of underground pipes and millions of gallons of fresh water instead of everyone taking care of their own with composting, sun and air, BSFL and earthworms. We've stripped our nutrients from our soils and worsened that with application of synthetic fertilizers.
I hope it is in the worms and they somehow keep it and pass on the good to us. That would be something.
Arkie's Vermiculture |
