A recent article in Focus Magazine points to the connection between secondary sewage treatment effluent poisoning the rivers that flow into Puget Sound, reduced chinook salmon survival, and famine for southern resident killer whales. The article is worth a read.
RIVERS RUNNING INTO PUGET SOUND have perennially low returns of chinook salmon—currently estimated at just 10 percent of their historic levels—even though many of them are enhanced with hatcheries. Last year, scientific research connected this decline to secondary sewage treatment plants discharging partially-treated effluent into Puget Sound.
Having learned of the pollutants’ effects in Puget Sound river estuaries, Washington state has taken action to point to Victoria’s discharge of raw sewage, and to talk about – but not fund – further research.