West Gloucester Wastewater Treatment Plant

The wastewater treatment plants across Cape Ann are at severe risk of inundation.^{1 2 3}

The Gloucester Wastewater Treatment plant is located on Essex Avenue south of the Blynman Canal, in an area that was formerly a salt marsh and is now a FEMA floodplain.^{4 5} The wastewater treatment plant was built in the 1970s and is managed by a public-private partnership between the City of Gloucester and Veolia Water North America Northeast. The plant treats sewers in the City of Gloucester and a limited amount of wastewater from the Town of Essex as well as trucked waste from commercial and residential holding tanks.⁶ The plant receives water from the Dykes, Wallace, and Haskell Reservoirs.^{7 8}

The wastewater treatment campus regularly floods during nor’easters. The Gloucester City Council passed the Water Pollution Facility Flood Mitigation Project in 2020 to erect a flood barrier around the water treatment plant, building on a grant from the Office of Coastal Zone Management.⁹

During future storm events, the campus will flood and the berm may be overtopped by a surge from the Annisquam River. Whenever power goes out, the treatment plant generator requires on-site manual startup. If conditions are hazardous and the staff evacuated, the plant will overflow, dumping sewage into the harbor and submerging expensive electrical equipment in corrosive seawater.

Marine flora and fauna will feel the effects of this sewage discharge for decades. It will devastate the commercial and residential shellfishing industry and cause a massive public health crisis as the population south of the Blynman canal becomes exposed to disease-ridden wastewater. Lawsuits from the Environmental Protection Agency will devastate the city budget, causing a series of long-term financial issues that all stem from a single storm event.