On 9/29/23, The Falmouth Enterprise printed an article “Falmouth’s Nitrogen Cleanup Plans Begin To Take Shape” by Gilda Geist on pages 1 & 12.
Excerpts:
The state Department of Environmental Protection passed regulations in June that require all Cape towns to start making progress toward cleaning up their impaired estuaries, which suffer from nitrogen pollution caused largely by traditional septic systems.
Under the new regulations, towns were given a choice between enforcing a mandate that all homeowners in nitrogen-sensitive areas install innovative/alternative (I/A) septic systems, or coming up with a series of legally binding plans to reduce nitrogen loading. These plans are known as watershed permits.
The select board voted for the watershed permit route in August…
Falmouth has 14 watersheds, all of which suffer from nitrogen pollution to varying degrees.
Areas shaded in green on the map represent currently sewered parcels. Areas shaded in pink represent the planned sewer area. Areas shaded in blue need some kind of septic upgrades to reduce nitrogen loading, but exactly what those upgrades entail is yet to be decided.
“These dark blue areas are potential areas where septic improvements need to occur, and this is based on the nitrogen removal requirements,” Ms. Rathjen said.
There are 5,300 parcels in the planned sewer area, Ms. Rathjen said. There are 3,300 parcels in the septic improvement area. The town has a total of about 22,000 parcels…