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5
Burning Rivers, Fading Paint, and the Clean Water Movement
第五章
燃烧的河流、褪色的油漆和清洁水运动
In the 1960s, Edwin Chadwick, Victor Hugo, Karl Marx, and their fellow reformers campaigned vigorously for centralized systems to helpfarmers capture the nutrients in the sewage pouring out of rapidly growingcities. But by the end of the century the widespread availability of inexpensive synthetic fertilizers had taken away the economic incentives for sewage farming.1 Without a market for the nutrients, it was hard to justify doing anything other than discharging sewage directly to surface waters. In locations where sewage posed obvious threats to drinking water, cities tappednew sources in distant watersheds, or they built drinking water treatment plants equipped with filters and chlorine disinfection systems.
19世纪60年代,查德威克、雨果、马克思及他们的改革派同仁极力推广集中式水系统,以帮助农民从迅速增长的城市污水中获得营养元素用于耕作。但到了19世纪末,廉价的人工合成化肥的广泛使用,使得污水灌溉不再有利可图[1]。由于没有人购买污水中的营养元素,就只能直接将污水排入地表水中。在饮用水源受到明显污染的那些地区,地方政府要去更远的流域开发新水源,或者建立配备有过滤装置和氯气消毒系统的饮用水处理厂。
Although these measures were effective in fighting waterborne disease,they did nothing to reduce the foul smells of sewage-polluted waters. Incoastal cities located on rivers, such as London and Boston, where the odors ofsewage made downtown living unpleasant, individual sewers were hooked togetherin regional systems with outlets draining to the ocean.2 After these sewer networks were built, wastes discharged by upstream communities and local industries still caused smells along the waterfront, but the situation wasvastly improved a few blocks from the water.3
尽管这些措施有效减少了水媒疾病的发生,却无助于消除污水的恶臭。像伦敦和波士顿这些有河流的沿海城市,由于市中心饱受污水恶臭的困扰,人们将区域系统内的独立管道与入海排污口连接到一起[2]。这些排污管网建成后,虽然上游和当地工厂排放的废物使得海滨附近的水域仍恶臭不断,但是在离这些水域稍微远一点的地方,情况则大有改善[3]。
During the nineteenth century few people paid attention to the odors caused by sewage discharges until they penetrated residential areas. While it may be hard to fathom for those of us accustomed to museums, restaurant, and condominiums situated on expensive waterfront real estate, the urban waterfronts of the early industrial period were bustling, low-rent zones where loading docks, factories, and power plants prevented the public from approaching the water. Even if people could get there, they might not be ableto distinguish the smell of sewage from the boat exhaust, burning coal, livestock, rotting vegetables and other items that moved along the docks and sometimesfell into the water.4
在19世纪,当污水排放引起的恶臭还没影响到居民区时,很少有人注意这个问题。对于我们这些已经习惯了昂贵的海滨地区的博物馆、饭店和公寓的人来说,很难想象在工业化时代的早期,城市海滨竟然是繁忙的廉租区。那里有装卸码头、工厂和发电厂,人们无法靠近海水。即使到了海边,也根本分辨不出哪是轮船尾气,哪是燃煤、牲畜、腐烂蔬菜发出的臭味;沿码头搬运和堆放的各类物品或者它们掉落入水中后,也会释放出怪味[4]。
(Last two paragraphs of Chapter 5)
The sewage treatment plants built during the twentieth century can bethought of as the third revolution in urban water infrastructure—Water 3.0. Gradual progress began with a recognition that cities were becoming too big torely on self-purification. Initially primary treatment plants were built as ameans of eliminating the aesthetic problems caused by oxygen depletion. But, aspopulation increased, more sophisticated treatment plants were needed to protect downstream drinking water supplies and aquatic ecosystems from the negative effects of sewage. Through the efforts of engineers at places like the Lawrence Experimental Station and the University of Manchester, reliable aboveground treatment processes were developed to harness the ability of microbes to purify water. But before the situation was perceived to be a major crisis, the publicwas reluctant to spend more than about a dollar a month per person to solve the problems posed by sewage. Ultimately, a public consensus to address sewage pollution at the national level coupled with a comprehensive set of laws and funding turned the situation around.
20世纪兴建的污水处理厂,可以称为第三次城市水处理基础设施的革命,即“水3.0”。缓慢的进步是这样开始的:人们意识到城市已经太大,不可能仅仅依靠水体的自净能力来解决污水问题。起初,初级污水处理厂的建立是为了消除由溶解氧的耗损而引发的恶臭。但是,随着人口的增长,我们的城市需要兴建更复杂的污水处理厂,以保护下游的供水和水生生态系统免遭污水的负面影响。经过劳伦斯实验站和曼彻斯特大学等单位的工程师们的努力,利用微生物净化污水的技术已开发出来。但是,在水污染被公认为是主要危机之前,人们不愿意在处理污水上花费每人每月多于1美元的投资。最终,多数人认为污水处理应该全国统一来解决,加上一系列配套的法律和联邦政府的拨款,这才扭转了美国水污染的局面。
Our modern sewage treatment plants were built to eliminate oxygen depletion, and in achieving this goal they solved many of the more pressingproblems of the day. But as cities have continued to grow, it has become clearthat treatment plants also have to remove nutrients, toxin metals, and synthetic organic chemicals. Technologies are available to accomplish thesetasks, but like the transition from primary treatment to secondary treatment, retrofitting sewage treatment plants will require additional funds. In addition, the initial rush to build treatment plants meant that adequate provisions were not made tosupport the maintenance and upgrades needed to keep the network of water and wastewater treatment systems working in the future. Now that our attention hadmoved on to other challenges, like greenhouse gases and climate change,additional regulations and government grants are unlikely to provide all of themeans necessary to replace the worn parts and make the needed improvements. We must address these problems now if we wish to avoid reversing much of the hard-won progress of the mid- to late twentieth century.
现代污水处理厂的建立,是基于消除溶解氧耗损而引发的恶臭。事实上,污水处理厂在消除恶臭的同时,还解决了许多当代十分紧迫的问题。然而,随着城市的持续扩大,人们意识到污水处理厂还必须去除污水中的营养素、有毒金属和合成有机化合物。在技术上,这些都可以做到;但是,就像从初级处理向二级处理转变一样,污水处理厂的改造需要额外的资金。此外,当初这些污水处理厂匆忙上马,这意味着库存不足,不能支持将来这些水和废水处理系统网络正常运行所需的维护和升级。现在,我们的注意力已转移到了其他的新的挑战,如温室气体和气候变化,额外的法律条例和政府的拨款不可能提供所有的必要资源,去更换磨损的零部件和进行必要的改进。如果我们珍惜20世纪中、后期所取得的来之不易的进步,不想重蹈覆辙,我们就必须从现在开始面对这些棘手的问题。
ps. I typed up the English myself, so errors are possible.
水4.0:饮用水的过去、现在与未来
[美]戴维·塞德拉克 著
徐向荣 等译 虞左俊 校
上海科学技术出版社
出版时间:2015.08
ISBN:978-7-5478-2729-1
定价:38元
Water 4.0: The Past, Present, and Future of the World's Most Vital Resource
Paperback:March 31, 2015
by David Sedlak (Author)
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