- Pollution & cleanup
- Water
- 1995 lawsuit; decrees 1998 and 1999; final deadline July 1, 2027
- City of Atlanta
- Location approximate
Combined sewers and the 1998-99 consent decrees
Atlanta's 19th-century sewers include combined sewers that dump sewage-laden stormwater into creeks in heavy rain. A 1995 lawsuit produced federal consent decrees in 1998 (combined overflows) and 1999 (sanitary sewers and treatment plants).
The record
The EPA, Georgia EPD, the Upper Chattahoochee Riverkeeper and a downstream citizen sued the city in 1995. The 1998 decree, signed under Mayor Bill Campbell, targeted combined sewer overflows; the 1999 First Amended Consent Decree covered sanitary overflows and the water reclamation centers. The city finished the CSO decree work in 2008, and in 2012 a federal judge granted a 13-year extension on the second decree, now due July 1, 2027. By 2014 the city had separated the Greensferry and McDaniel basins and the Stockade sub-basin, reaching about 90% separation; six CSO facilities remain (Tanyard Creek, Clear Creek, North Avenue, Custer Avenue, Intrenchment Creek and West Area) serving an 11-square-mile core. The R. M. Clayton plant here on Bolton Road dates from 1935 and received a new CSO treatment facility at the end of the West Area tunnel.
Today: R. M. Clayton Water Reclamation Center on the Chattahoochee.