Geese spur greener cleanup system at Mt. Trashmore

VIRGINIA BEACH

There they were, lingering on the periphery of the unveiling of a new day in storm-water filtration.

"Our little culprits," the Beach's storm-water chief called them. Geese. They are the reason the city used this one-tenth of an acre in the shadow of Mount Trashmore as a site for a new storm-water filtration system.

Nature dictates that the geese do their thing, fecalwise. Gravity dictates that the rainwater washes the bacteria into Thalia Creek, a Lynnhaven River tributary.

The new system, called Bacterra, lowers the bacteria content by 94 percent and nutrients such as phosphorus that are harmful to waterways by 73 percent, according to the Virginia company, Americast, that makes the system. The system also filters pollutants such as oil, grease and sediments.

"It's part of a solution," said Glen Payton, regional sales manager for Americast.

He said it could contribute to water-quality improvements in the Lynnhaven River watershed.

The system looks like a typical concrete storm-water inlet but with a curious embellishment on top: an ornamental bush. Surface water flows downhill into the inlet, where it passes through a layer of mulch, peat, sand and crushed rock before collecting in an outfall pipe. The bush helps absorb nutrients.

The only maintenance required, Americast officials say, is changing the 1-foot-deep layer of mulch twice a year.

"You want people to see what we're doing," city storm-water chief Bill Johnston said of the highly visible Trashmore location. "Ninety percent of water quality is changing people's thinking."

The system could be used in many places in Virginia Beach, Johnston said Thursday at an unveiling attended by Americast and city officials.

He suggested municipal parking lots - where there's no natural filtration - as a place to start.

With stricter state storm-water standards being weighed, Johnston said Bacterra could show up in the private sector, much like Americast's Filterra system, which removes nutrients, not bacteria. Filterra is used at more than 100 sites in the Beach, Payton said.

The test site is outfitted with equipment that will gauge bacteria and nutrients going in and what comes out. After a year-long study, Johnston said, the city will decide whether to expand the system.

The project, which cost about $50,000, was funded in part by a state Water Quality Improvement Grant.

John Warren, (757) 222-5114, john.warren@pilotonline.com