Perhaps the BEST B1G Forum anywhere, here at College Football Fan Site, CFB51!!!

If environmental regulations were eliminated today, do you think everyone would continue to play nice?

I do think most all would play nice.

I'll say something about the EPA, given that I've done a lot of work on cleanup sites, and I actually know what I'm talking about, unlike most here.

The amount of "waste" in that agency is startling. I had a project a few years ago, out in Vancouver, WA. It was a cleanup site, and in order to do it right, we had to run about a mile of sanitary sewer so that the effluent could be further treated at the local treatment plant before final discharge.

I got my hands on the EPA's design, and on behalf of my client, did some value engineering. I was able to get the construction cost to about 1/3 of what the EPA's engineering consultant (URS) came up with, and it was a better design too. Much better. Theirs relied on pumps and valves and other crap to make the thing "work". I was like an "academic" designed the thing. My solution was completely gravity. The latter is more reliable (duh).

There are a ton of redundant regulations, by the way.

yes, meat packers would dump raw sewage into rivers if they could

One task I would take on if President would be to direct that the CFR be rewritten to make it consistent, clearly worded, and understandable.  That would take forever of course, and ti still wouldn't be anywhere near good, but it might help.

The parts I dealt with might as well have been written in Chinese or something.

One task I would take on if President would be to direct that the CFR be rewritten to make it consistent, clearly worded, and understandable.  That would take forever of course, and ti still wouldn't be anywhere near good, but it might help.

The parts I dealt with might as well have been written in Chinese or something.

I like that idea, and I also think this needs to happen at the State and local levels too.

I could direct you to a county website, wherein the rules in the stormwater sections dictate that wetlands will not be filled (understandable, and correct). Then, in the health department section, it advises people that standing water should not be allowed on your property, so as to stop the West Nile Virus (mosquitos).

This confuses people.

This thread is about to be toast.

If it's sourdough toast, I'll take an order. 

It's super silly to pay for, but sometimes I'm at a place with nice breakfasts and it just completes the meal. 

(To maintain the environmental quota ... uh ... I live next to a river where I'm positive they used to dump any old thing. People still fish in the thing. They once pulled up a civil war cannon)

I do think most all would play nice.

I'll say something about the EPA, given that I've done a lot of work on cleanup sites, and I actually know what I'm talking about, unlike most here.

The amount of "waste" in that agency is startling. I had a project a few years ago, out in Vancouver, WA. It was a cleanup site, and in order to do it right, we had to run about a mile of sanitary sewer so that the effluent could be further treated at the local treatment plant before final discharge.

I got my hands on the EPA's design, and on behalf of my client, did some value engineering. I was able to get the construction cost to about 1/3 of what the EPA's engineering consultant (URS) came up with, and it was a better design too. Much better. Theirs relied on pumps and valves and other crap to make the thing "work". I was like an "academic" designed the thing. My solution was completely gravity. The latter is more reliable (duh).

There are a ton of redundant regulations, by the way.

Your experience is different than mine.  I worked in instrumentation and control for a few years and those guys would try everything they could to skirt the rules.

I have a small story from a papermill.  This papermill ran a controlled amount of wastewater into a river.  It was strictly regulated by the EPA.  They paid a guy big bucks a few times a year to make sure it was calibrated correctly.  This went on for 20+years, until the meter eventually went bad and there was no way to fix it.  They contacted us, we sent them a brand new, fancy meter, high end certifications, the works.  They install it, and immediately call us, furious, because it was faulty.  That didn't make sense to us, because it had been calibrated just a couple of days earlier.  Maybe it was damaged in shipment.  It happens. 

There wasn't enough time to make a new meter, so our guys went out there with some ultrasonic flow meters that you can just stick on the outside of the pipe.  These meters weren't as accurate, but their numbers were so far off it would at least put them in the right ballpark until we could fix the problem.  We install these meters, and are shocked to see that the flow measurements match the "faulty" meter exactly.

When we explain to the executives at the papermill that our meter is correct, they argue that they have had their meter inspected and calibrated a few times a year, and that our numbers must be wrong.  We ask to see the paperwork. 

Their guy faked everything.  All he did was test the electronics.  The company let this go on for years.  Here's the thing...we had been trying to earn their calibration business for awhile, and they always said their guy did it for a fraction of our cost.  We could never figure that out.  The only way to truly calibrate a meter like this is to take it out, ship it to a calibration facility, run it against a known standard, ship it back, and then reinstall it.  That's why most of these places had multiple meters, as they would just swap each one out as needed to keep their factory running.  The EPA requirements specified this, as well.

The guy knew what he was doing, and was making a killing with nothing but a voltmeter.  The company chose to turn a blind a blind eye, because they were saving thousands of dollars in labor, testing, and equipment.  The company was also either ignorant or willfully ignoring the EPA rules. 

Now the jig was up.  They were looking at paying 20+ years of fines from the EPA totaling well into the millions.  They promptly decided to "go with another contractor."  We never heard another thing about it.  We had a good relationship with that company, and in the next two years they never let us on their plant again.  I watched the news to see if they would come clean.  Nothing.  The guy should have gotten jail time.  Nope.

That's just one story out of many I have. 

If you expect it, you must monitor it. 

The pulp mills have a very hard time meeting water regulations, very hard.  To do it properly takes a lot of money.  I'm not at all surprised to hear that one would be delighted to pretend there is no problem.  

We imported a lot of eucalyptus fiber from Brazil where I imagine they don't have these issues at all.  I know one company had a floating pulp mill and they dumped their effluent into the Amazon, no problem.