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The CHAIRMAN. Now, right on that question, if you please, I started to say to you earlier that I read some years ago an article in one of the leading magazines on "Birmingham, the best governed and richest city in the world." That was the heading of the article. It was practically a review of the history of Joseph Chamberlain.

Birmingham is a large city, and they said that when Chamberlain became mayor he found they had no sewage disposal system. In the first place they bought up the slums of the city, the city bought all its slums and cleaned them off. Then they installed a sewage disposal system by buying a farm outside the city and using it in some way in connection with the carrying on of a municipal farm, and they said that system had been in use in Germany for many

years.

Mr. RANDOLPH. Sewage farming, yes; it has been tried. It is not

a success.

Mr. KINDRED. Does that involve a chemical to destroy the noxious material?

Mr. RANDOLPH. No; it is a biological process, it is popularly described as a bug process. It is the separation of the solids from the sewage liquor. The solids are digested either separately or in two storide compartments, it is separate digestion of the solids at any rate by one kind of bacteria, and an oxidation of the sewage effluents, the sewage liquor, by another kind of bacteria. The oxidizing bacteria are called aerobes. They have to have air to live, and they break down the sewage and form inoffensive and stable precipitants and the sludge is digested by the other kind of bacteria the anaerobes.

Mr. KINDRED. Have you spoken of the chemical agents used to destroy the noxious part of the sewage

Mr. RANDOLPH. That is biolytic treatment, the killing of the bacteria in the clarified effluents; the air is forced through the raw sewage and fed to the anaerobic bacteria, and then the sludge is settled out and dried and wherever possible used for fertlizer. That is the big problem, the disposal of the sludge. We have been experimenting in Chicago with the use of this activated sludge as fertilizer, with good results. It has been used at the experiment station there, and we hope to develop a market for that sludge, that will at least pay the expense of this process.

Mr. KINDRED. Is alum better than chlorinated lime preparations? Mr. RANDOLPH. That is another problem. The chlorinated lime comes as a precipitant and produces a much larger volume of sludge. It is used with the electrolitic treatment also. That is a bone of contention among the engineers and city officials right now. Our friends in Toronto are playing with it now.

This is an Imhoff type tank [showing another picture], these are two-story tanks in which the sewage is settled through settling chambers at the top of the tank. The sludge comes down into the digestion chambers in the lower part and the clarified effluent taken off from the top of the tank, put through sprinkling filters and sent into the drainage outlet.

All of the sewage has to be pumped, as I told you, pumped into the interceptors, pumped through the plant, pumped several times in the process. This plant takes care of the pollution in the Calumet

River. The sanitary district has another plant under construction now at Evanston to take care of that suburban territory, and to take care of a population of 800,000 within the next five years. That plant will be practically twice the size of the Milwaukee plant which is now under construction, and which has not yet done anything except it takes a partial flow of the sewage.

The Milwaukee plant is designed to take care of a population of 500,000 by 1930, and their interceptors are not yet completed. The plant is not completed. The river at Milwaukee to-day is an open septic tank. Modern methods of sewage disposal as exemplified in Milwaukee are being duplicated in Chicago; several other plants of this kind are projected.

There is a board consisting of three able and well-known engineers that has charge of the Milwaukee plant. They are Mr. Fuller of New York, Mr. Eddy of Boston, and Mr. Hatton of Milwaukee. They are at the top of their profession in that line of work.

Parenthetically, we have an engineer in the employ of the sanıtary district, who has charge of the sewage-disposal program, Mr. Langdon Pierce, who is preeminent in that line of work in the profession. He has developed the experimental work, an experimental laboratory, and the whole program of sewage disposal has been developed under his direction. He has also been of great assistance to other cities and municipalities in giving them the benefit of our experience in this connection.

This plant is to be operated by the electric power from Lockport, but as there is always a danger of break in the power line, and especially in time of a storm-which is the very time when this power is needed most-it is necessary to put in standpipe power, and this plant was constructed for that purpose [picture].

These are the Imhoff tanks at the Calumet plant showing the upper section of the plants, and in the foreground is the sludge drying ground. At Rochester they persuaded the farmers to buy that sludge. The farmers are now hauling away all the sludge they can produce at Rochester, I understand, for 75 cents a load.

Mr. KINDRED. Do you understand that sludge may produce typhoid fever very fruitfully?

Mr. RANDOLPH. No; that is still a moot question. An investigation recently made indicated that activated sludge will not, and there is still a question as to Imhoff sludge. This is the raw sewage as it comes into the plant [showing a picture].

Mr. KINDRED. May I ask a question right there, Mr. Chairman? The CHAIRMAN. Yes.

Mr. KINDRED. Is it, as alleged by some theorists, perfectly safe to drink that purified sewage?

Mr. RANDOLPH. No, sir.

Mr. KINDRED. That has been alleged.

Mr. RANDOLPH. I know it has. Purification, as I have told you, is a comparative term. A man might drink it, but it would not be safe; it would have to be further purified by biolytic agents to kill the germs remaining in that clarified effluent.

Now, the present sewage-disposal program contemplates the requirements for the present and also for the future. The heaviest load of the plant at present is the waste from the Chicago Union Stockyards, which is the equivalent from domestic sewage waste of a

population of a million people. Before the war agreement had been reached that the packers build an activated sludge plant to take care of that waste on a division of 40 per cent and 60 per cent, that was the basis of the division; but the war came along and delayed that construction, and since the war nothing has been done, and the board has recently brought a suit to enjoin the packers from emptying this waste into the stream. That is the most important plant to be constructed. The others are constructed

The CHAIRMAN (interposing). Suppose you succeed in that suit, how much would that reduce your needs as to water?

Mr. RANDOLPH. Our need as to water is not met now

The CHAIRMAN. That is not my question.

Mr. RANDOLPH. I will answer that. The levels of the Great Lakes

The CHAIRMAN. Now, wait a minute. Just hold up your machine a minute.

(The moving-picture machine was stopped.)

The CHAIRMAN. Now, the question is, Suppose you succeed in your suit against the packers, how much would that lessen the demand and ned for water in Chicago?

Mr. RANDOLPH. It would not lessen it because we have not got the

water

The CHAIRMAN. That is not my question. In other words, how much water do you have to use for the purpose of the packers? That is a simple and easy question.

Mr. RANDOLPH. On the basis of the equivalent of the domestic sewage from a million people.

The CHAIRMAN. What does that mean, what is your population? Mr. RANDOLPH. Our population is over 3,000,000; about 3,200,000. The CHAIRMAN. In other words, it would lessen your need of water one-third?

Mr. RANDOLPH. No; it would not.

The CHAIRMAN. Well, why not? You don't have to figure on that.

Mr. RANDOLPH. We have to add to that 3,200,000 this equivalent of 1,000,000 in industrial waste, making 4,200,000.

The CHAIRMAN. You don't have it added there at all; you have at as an incident, you have it as one of the things.

Mr. RANDOLPH. We have it as the most vital part of that problem now.

The CHAIRMAN. And that utilizes and takes one-third of all you have.

Mr. BARRETT. Our human population is over 3,000,000.

The CHAIRMAN. Then call that 4,000,000.

Mr. BARRETT. Then we have additional trade wastes, almost equivalent to another million.

Mr. HULL. The packers alone are worth a million people, the same as a million people.

The CHAIRMAN. That does not change your original answer to your problem at all. You are using a certain amount of water to-day. Your population is 3,200,000, approximately 3,000,000, and the packers' uses amount to 1,000,000 and 1 will go into 3, 3 times. Mr. RANDOLPH. But it is four.

Mr. BARRETT. You have to add another million.

The CHAIRMAN. Oh, no.

Mr. HULL. They have 3,000,000 people they have to take care of and the packers make another million, and the waste is another million.

The CHAIRMAN. Oh, no; that is not the question at all. You have actually 3,000,000 people who are using a certain amount of water and the packers amount to 1,000.000 as water users.

Mr. RANDOLPH. Let me make this plain. The present load of the canal takes care of a domestic population of 3,200,000 plus the packers use, which is equivalent to a million, making 4,200,000; and other industrial wastes are equivalent to another million, making 5,200,000. So that is the present load of the canal, and we are required by the act to dilute that in the proportion of 33 cubic feet per second.

The CHAIRMAN. I do not think your problem is sound. I think it is plain that you have 3,200,000 population, and you do not add a million to that because a certain part of the 3,000,000 are engaged in businesses.

Mr. RANDOLPH. Oh, no

The CHAIRMAN. Nor do you add to the figure because certain other trades are engaged in other businesses; you still have 3,000,000. Mr. RANDOLPH. I am not talking about the domestic purposesThe CHAIRMAN. For those 3,000,000 people you use a certain amount of water and you say that the use of that water is equivalent to what a million people would use.

Mr. BARRETT. Oh, no. You do not quite understand. May I explain it ?

The CHAIRMAN. Yes; I don't care who explains it.

Mr. BARRETT. It is not the amount of the population engaged in the stockyards that we are talking about; it is the wastes that come from the care and treatment of cattle and other animals, not human at all, but the trade waste equivalent to the amount of waste of over 1,000,000 people.

The CHAIRMAN. I understand that.

Mr. BARRETT. Which must be added to your 3,200,000.

The CHAIRMAN. But in any community in the United States you will have business, either manufacturing or otherwise, which will produce what you say the packers produce. That will not alter the total population in that city: the total of population will remain the same. The total of what they use for water for sewage purposes will remain the same.

Mr. BARRETT. I don't think you have it right at all, because we need a certain amount of dilution for the human sewage of 3,200,000. If we could not have any more than enough to take care of that, we would not properly treat the trade wastes that come from the stockyards: nor would we treat the trade wastes that come from the corn products, nor from the tanneries. Those are three main trade wastes and they produce as much as the equivalent of the sewage of 2.000.000 human population.

Mr. RANDOLPH. That adds to your human population.

The CHAIRMAN. I do not see that your statement alters the situation at all. Here is the situation. You are using a certain amount

of water to-day for total sewage purposes. You say that when you come to subdivide that water you are using out of your total the equivalent of 1,000,000, what would be an equivalent for the disposal of the sewage for 1,000,000 people for a certain purpose. That does not add to the total of the water you are using to-day; your total water used remains the same.

Mr. BARRETT. But the total of our needs do not remain the same, Mr. Dempsey.

The CHAIRMAN. Wait just one minute. Now, you have a suit brought to enjoin the packers from using their quantity of water. Mr. BARRETT. Yes.

The CHAIRMAN. Now, your needs are not going to increase.

Mr. BARRETT. No; not from the use of their quantity of water, but from dumping this trade waste into the canal.

The CHAIRMAN. Of course; but that uses just so much water. Now, when you have enjoined the packers, supposing you are successful, then you will have, by that, disposed of the need of water for 1,000,000 people.

Mr. BARRETT. No; let me see if I can make it clear. The experts who have determined the amount of water necessary for the proper dilution of human sewage, and others, I take it, reach the conclusion that 3.33 per cent, or what would be the equivalent of 10,000 cubic feet per second of water, is necessary to treat 3,000,000 human population. We have added to that, on account of trade wastes, another million from the stockyards, and still another million from other trade wastes; so that the 10,000 cubic second-feet we have now, and which we say we are entitled to have, is not sufficient to treat the 5,000,000 of population (3,200,000 actual humans and 2,000,000 equivalents in trade values.)

The CHAIRMAN Now, let me answer your proposition. As I have understood the witness, he is testifying you are not using 10,000 cubic feet per second but are using 8,500 cubic feet per second, and with that 8,500 cubic feet per second you are taking care of not simply your 3,000,000 people, but you are taking care of that 3,200,000 and of the natural incidents of a large population of that kind of certain large industries like the packers, and the tanners, and some third one that you spoke of.

Mr. BARRETT. The corn products. The CHAIRMAN. The corn products. So, call it as you will, 3,200,000, which it is, or 5,000,000, which it is not, none the less you are taking care of it with 8.500 cubic feet. That is the way it appears from the testimony of the witness.

Mr. RANDOLPH. Oh, no.

Mr. BARRETT. There is one thing I want to call your attention. to before Mr. Randolph goes on. Our Calumet-Sag Channel we have not been permitted to handle in the way which we think is the right way to handle it. The War Department has not given us a permit to dredge so that we can put our 1,500 additional feet in it. Mr. RANDOLPH. We have a concentration of sewage pollution there that has brought complaints from the valley.

The CHAIRMAN. You say that you are discharging the sewage. in an offensive form on the Illinois farms?

Mr RANDOLPH. That it has created nuisances there, and that it is not complying with the State law.

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