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Fresh water pollution control in Europe
Water Research Pergamon Press 1968. Vol. 2, pp. 527-529. Printed in Great Britain
BOOK REVIEWS Fresh Water Pollution Control in Europe. Council of Europe, 1966. THIS important report by the Council of Europe (1966) arose from an instruction issued in 1963 to its Cultural and Scientific Committee by the Consultative Assembly of the Council of Europe to investigate the question of fresh water pollution in Europe. Consequently, a working party which included representatives from the Committees on Agriculture and on Social affairs was set up and eventually it presented its report in October 1965. The problems considered related exclusively to fresh water pollution. If the conclusions of the report are implemented a substantial advance will have been made in the difficult subject of effective international co-operation in pollution control. The first quarter of this 205 page report is taken up with an introduction to the subject of water pollution. This section is of less consequence than the remainder of the report. If the technical aspects of water pollution must be dealt with at an elementary level in a report of this kind, at least the principles of self-purification and of sewage purification should be given in sufficient detail so that the non-technical reader is able to understand the causes and effects of pollution, as well as appreciate the technical and administrative measures necessary to control it. The non-technical reader is not helped by a map of a river basin, shown without any explanatory caption and with indecipherable tributaries. Nor can an outline diagram of a sewage treatment plant that takes up two pages tell the reader what the function of each part of the plant is without some verbal description of the plant; an attempt to do so would have prevented the diagrammatic display of a waterlogged trickling filter. The statement that "it is very expensive to cleanse polluted water, or better still, to prevent pollution", leaves the reviewer guessing as to whether the prevention of pollution is really more expensive than purifying polluted water. Concerning pollution prevention measures, there is the surprising statement that, "This is a new problem facing national economies and one which has not yet been solved." To countries that are only just embarking on anti-pollution legislation because they have hitherto turned their backs on the subject, it may seem a new problem, but there are many countries where the novelty of the problem has long worn off and where much has been done towards solving it. Fortunately, in a later section of the report dealing with legislation and administration the degree of control over pollution that is exercised in a number of European countries is adequately recognized. An attempt is made to show how costly it it is to purify domestic sewage and how much less costly the process is when it is carried out on a larger scale. But to cease with the costs of treatment of the sewage from 10,000 inhabitants is to stop a long way off the point at which the cost of sewage treatment continues to be reduced by carrying out the process on a very large scale. In any case, the costs of sewage treatment in no matter which currency they are quoted are extremely difficult to interpret~ partly because one must be able to relate the costs to the cost of living or other services and one must also know the degree of purification that is achieved. Perhaps it would assist the reader to have some basis of comparison if the cost of water purchased from the public supply were to be quoted together with the cost of sewage treatment. In this connection, a wealth of information is already available concerning the costs at over 300 works in Great Britain as a result of an inquiry conducted by the Institute of Municipal Treasurers and Accountants and published by them in 1967 under the title of "Sewage Purification and Disposal Statistics 1965-66". The treatment of sewage in oxidation ponds, which is referred to as primitive, is in fact capable of producing effluents of satisfactory chemical and biological quality at low cost under the right climatic conditions. If it is still true, in 1966, as stated of page 55, "that in Chicago, the extraction of vitamin B12 from domestic sewage has proved a very profitable operation", the lay reader might well ask why other municipal authorities have not followed suit. The account that is given of the legislative and administrative action taken in several European countries to combat pollution is interesting and extremely useful for comparative purposes. The section on International Law concerning pollution is of world-wide interest, since so frequently rivers cross national boundaries or delineate national frontiers. In this connection the Swiss Federal Law of 16 March 1955 is exemplary, since it requires that collaboration with neighbouring states is sought in order to protect from pollution surface and ground water at or crossing national 527
528
Book Reviews
frontiers. The objects of the International Commission for the protection of the Rhine against pollution are also referred to. The importance of the work that lies ahead for this Commission is illustrated by the fact that 15,000 tons of residual potassium salts are discharged into the Rhine every day at Alsace, which with the added discharges of salts from the mining areas of the Ruhr occurring farther down the river, render the water virtually useless by the time it reaches the Netherlands. Reference is made to the efforts of the World Health Organization to promote action to improve water supplies and control pollution; both these are seen as different aspects of the same subject. It is useful to be able to find on page 110 a summary of the various facets of water pollution control with which the World Health Organization concerns itself. The most important section of the Report is the adoption of a recommendation as to the steps that are needed by member countries concerning international action in order to control water pollution. The section may be summarized by stating that the Assembly of the Council of Europe, recognizing the importance of water supply and the need to keep unpolluted rivers clean, prevent polluted rivers from becoming worse and to improve the quality of those that are already polluted, calls for agreement on certain principles in order to solve water pollution problems, to co-operate in carrying out research work, in the training of personnel and in the field of legislation and administration. It recommends member governments to initiate joint action to control pollution by various methods. Expert Committees and the Secretariat of the Council of Europe, the recommendations continue, should be instructed to draft a "Water Charter". The guiding principles to be adopted are to preserve surface and underground water, provide good drinking water at reasonable cost, conserve natural fauna and flora, provide water for agricultural and recreational purposes; these are principles that should be adoped as government and international government policy. The construction of plants for treating polluting matter should be encouraged. The formation of international drainage areas should also be promoted. The recommendations of the Assembly deserve careful study and implementation by the member countries. S. H. JENKrNs
Torrey Canyon Pollution and Marine Life. A report by the Plymouth Laboratory of the Marine Biological Association of the United Kingdom. Edited by J. E. SMm-I. 196 pp. Cambridge University Press, 1968.55/-, $9.50. THE TANKERTorrey Canyon, carrying 117,000 tons of crude oil, foundered on a reef 15 miles from the Cornish coast at the south-westerly tip of England on 18 March 1967. The oil carried by the tanker was of a type that may lose 25 per cent by volatilization in a few days. In dispersing the oil at sea and in cleansing rocks and beaches of oil along 140 miles of coastline, the British authorities used about 2½ million Imperial gallons of detergent. Many organizations collaborated in a national effort to prevent the oil from reaching beaches which attract large numbers of visitors during holiday periods. Almost the entire scientific staff of the Plymouth Laboratory of the Marine Biological Association of the United Kingdom, some 50 in number, devoted themselves for ten weeks to a study of the biological consequences of the discharge of oil and of the use of the detergents to disperse and dissolve it. The circumstances demanded some limitation of the objectives of investigation. Of importance was a study of the effect of the detergents used on animals living on the sea floor. To a large extent the detergents used were mainly non-ionic, consisting of derivatives of phenyl ethylene oxide condensates in various solvents which contained kerosene or aromatic compounds. Observation showed that the oil sometimes re-formed a separate oil layer after it had been dispersed with detergent. From a survey of phytoplankton it was concluded that the smallest flagellates--Prasinophyceae-were able to react to concentrations of toxic substances in the sea water that were too low to be detected by the available method of chemical analysis. The sea water did not contain much above the lethal level of substances toxic to diatoms and dinoflagellates, and the colourless flagellates were unaffected by the water taken from areas covered with oil. Experiments carried out in the laboratory showed that the detergents used were extremely toxic to marine planktonic organisms, especially the microzooplankton. It would be impossible to define a safe level of detergent concentration because of the wide variations shown by different species in their response to detergents. However, some animals exhibited acute effects in the presence of less than I
BOOK REVIEWS Fresh Water Pollution Control in Europe. Council of Europe, 1966. THIS important report by the Council of Europe (1966) arose from an instruction issued in 1963 to its Cultural and Scientific Committee by the Consultative Assembly of the Council of Europe to investigate the question of fresh water pollution in Europe. Consequently, a working party which included representatives from the Committees on Agriculture and on Social affairs was set up and eventually it presented its report in October 1965. The problems considered related exclusively to fresh water pollution. If the conclusions of the report are implemented a substantial advance will have been made in the difficult subject of effective international co-operation in pollution control. The first quarter of this 205 page report is taken up with an introduction to the subject of water pollution. This section is of less consequence than the remainder of the report. If the technical aspects of water pollution must be dealt with at an elementary level in a report of this kind, at least the principles of self-purification and of sewage purification should be given in sufficient detail so that the non-technical reader is able to understand the causes and effects of pollution, as well as appreciate the technical and administrative measures necessary to control it. The non-technical reader is not helped by a map of a river basin, shown without any explanatory caption and with indecipherable tributaries. Nor can an outline diagram of a sewage treatment plant that takes up two pages tell the reader what the function of each part of the plant is without some verbal description of the plant; an attempt to do so would have prevented the diagrammatic display of a waterlogged trickling filter. The statement that "it is very expensive to cleanse polluted water, or better still, to prevent pollution", leaves the reviewer guessing as to whether the prevention of pollution is really more expensive than purifying polluted water. Concerning pollution prevention measures, there is the surprising statement that, "This is a new problem facing national economies and one which has not yet been solved." To countries that are only just embarking on anti-pollution legislation because they have hitherto turned their backs on the subject, it may seem a new problem, but there are many countries where the novelty of the problem has long worn off and where much has been done towards solving it. Fortunately, in a later section of the report dealing with legislation and administration the degree of control over pollution that is exercised in a number of European countries is adequately recognized. An attempt is made to show how costly it it is to purify domestic sewage and how much less costly the process is when it is carried out on a larger scale. But to cease with the costs of treatment of the sewage from 10,000 inhabitants is to stop a long way off the point at which the cost of sewage treatment continues to be reduced by carrying out the process on a very large scale. In any case, the costs of sewage treatment in no matter which currency they are quoted are extremely difficult to interpret~ partly because one must be able to relate the costs to the cost of living or other services and one must also know the degree of purification that is achieved. Perhaps it would assist the reader to have some basis of comparison if the cost of water purchased from the public supply were to be quoted together with the cost of sewage treatment. In this connection, a wealth of information is already available concerning the costs at over 300 works in Great Britain as a result of an inquiry conducted by the Institute of Municipal Treasurers and Accountants and published by them in 1967 under the title of "Sewage Purification and Disposal Statistics 1965-66". The treatment of sewage in oxidation ponds, which is referred to as primitive, is in fact capable of producing effluents of satisfactory chemical and biological quality at low cost under the right climatic conditions. If it is still true, in 1966, as stated of page 55, "that in Chicago, the extraction of vitamin B12 from domestic sewage has proved a very profitable operation", the lay reader might well ask why other municipal authorities have not followed suit. The account that is given of the legislative and administrative action taken in several European countries to combat pollution is interesting and extremely useful for comparative purposes. The section on International Law concerning pollution is of world-wide interest, since so frequently rivers cross national boundaries or delineate national frontiers. In this connection the Swiss Federal Law of 16 March 1955 is exemplary, since it requires that collaboration with neighbouring states is sought in order to protect from pollution surface and ground water at or crossing national 527
528
Book Reviews
frontiers. The objects of the International Commission for the protection of the Rhine against pollution are also referred to. The importance of the work that lies ahead for this Commission is illustrated by the fact that 15,000 tons of residual potassium salts are discharged into the Rhine every day at Alsace, which with the added discharges of salts from the mining areas of the Ruhr occurring farther down the river, render the water virtually useless by the time it reaches the Netherlands. Reference is made to the efforts of the World Health Organization to promote action to improve water supplies and control pollution; both these are seen as different aspects of the same subject. It is useful to be able to find on page 110 a summary of the various facets of water pollution control with which the World Health Organization concerns itself. The most important section of the Report is the adoption of a recommendation as to the steps that are needed by member countries concerning international action in order to control water pollution. The section may be summarized by stating that the Assembly of the Council of Europe, recognizing the importance of water supply and the need to keep unpolluted rivers clean, prevent polluted rivers from becoming worse and to improve the quality of those that are already polluted, calls for agreement on certain principles in order to solve water pollution problems, to co-operate in carrying out research work, in the training of personnel and in the field of legislation and administration. It recommends member governments to initiate joint action to control pollution by various methods. Expert Committees and the Secretariat of the Council of Europe, the recommendations continue, should be instructed to draft a "Water Charter". The guiding principles to be adopted are to preserve surface and underground water, provide good drinking water at reasonable cost, conserve natural fauna and flora, provide water for agricultural and recreational purposes; these are principles that should be adoped as government and international government policy. The construction of plants for treating polluting matter should be encouraged. The formation of international drainage areas should also be promoted. The recommendations of the Assembly deserve careful study and implementation by the member countries. S. H. JENKrNs
Torrey Canyon Pollution and Marine Life. A report by the Plymouth Laboratory of the Marine Biological Association of the United Kingdom. Edited by J. E. SMm-I. 196 pp. Cambridge University Press, 1968.55/-, $9.50. THE TANKERTorrey Canyon, carrying 117,000 tons of crude oil, foundered on a reef 15 miles from the Cornish coast at the south-westerly tip of England on 18 March 1967. The oil carried by the tanker was of a type that may lose 25 per cent by volatilization in a few days. In dispersing the oil at sea and in cleansing rocks and beaches of oil along 140 miles of coastline, the British authorities used about 2½ million Imperial gallons of detergent. Many organizations collaborated in a national effort to prevent the oil from reaching beaches which attract large numbers of visitors during holiday periods. Almost the entire scientific staff of the Plymouth Laboratory of the Marine Biological Association of the United Kingdom, some 50 in number, devoted themselves for ten weeks to a study of the biological consequences of the discharge of oil and of the use of the detergents to disperse and dissolve it. The circumstances demanded some limitation of the objectives of investigation. Of importance was a study of the effect of the detergents used on animals living on the sea floor. To a large extent the detergents used were mainly non-ionic, consisting of derivatives of phenyl ethylene oxide condensates in various solvents which contained kerosene or aromatic compounds. Observation showed that the oil sometimes re-formed a separate oil layer after it had been dispersed with detergent. From a survey of phytoplankton it was concluded that the smallest flagellates--Prasinophyceae-were able to react to concentrations of toxic substances in the sea water that were too low to be detected by the available method of chemical analysis. The sea water did not contain much above the lethal level of substances toxic to diatoms and dinoflagellates, and the colourless flagellates were unaffected by the water taken from areas covered with oil. Experiments carried out in the laboratory showed that the detergents used were extremely toxic to marine planktonic organisms, especially the microzooplankton. It would be impossible to define a safe level of detergent concentration because of the wide variations shown by different species in their response to detergents. However, some animals exhibited acute effects in the presence of less than I