Soap Opera
Published on August 17, 2009
Spokane became the butt of some national jokes with its ban on phosphorous-laden detergent. But Sunday’s S-R reports the “new storyline: it’s working.”
The lead story in Sunday’s Spokesman-Review (8/16/09) has some encouraging news for those who supported and worked for a ban on the sale of dishwasher soaps containing phosphorus (>.5%). A year after the Spokane County became the first county in America
to implement such a ban, the S-R’s Jonathan Brunt reports, data collected at the city’s sewage treatment plant shows a near 11 percent reduction in phosphorus in the untreated wastewater coming into the plant, as compared to the annual average of the three previous years.
As Brunt notes in his story, the ban on the phosphorus-laden soap (usually marked as containing “phosphates”) has been a regular inspiration for regional and national news stories about agitated consumers in eastern Washington making special trips into Idaho to buy dishwasher soaps that are illegal to sell in Spokane County stores.
“But a year after Spokane County became the only place in the country to ban dishwasher detergents made up of more than 0.5 percent phosphorus,” Brunt writes, “there’s a new storyline: it’s working.”
Brunt’s story also provides a progress report on the city’s on-going efforts at testing a half-dozen wastewater treatment technologies for phosphorus removal. The Spokane experiment, he reports, is perhaps the most large-scale experiment underway in the nation and will continue into next year.
For additional information on the Spokane County dishwasher soap restrictions and how they help the environment go here.