Smell at Kinsmen displeasing, but not harmful

Times Reporter       

 

People walking around Kinsmen Lake may have noticed an unpleasant sour egg smell. The smell is associated with the storm water system, and though it’s not new to the town, it hasn’t been an issue in a couple of years. 

“What steps are we considering should the issue become dangerous to the residents, are these levels being monitored and at what rate and are the results of the monitoring available to the public,” said Councillor Bob Sobol at the March 19 town council meeting. 

After the incident in 2010, which was significantly worse that what is being experienced now, the town installed a couple of aerators in 2011 and started some chemical microorganism treatment to help with some of the sludge. 

“We thought that this was helping with the situation. What we expect is happening in the lake is as the organic matter decays in Kinsmen Lake,” said Director of Operations and Engineering Jesse Parker. 

He further stated the small is not just coming from Kinsmen Lake, but is also at other stormwater ponds throughout town. With the aerators the town tried putting more oxygen into the water, because if there is more oxygen in the water it tends to help with preventing or limiting the decay or organic matter in the ponds, and then the H2S that’s coming from that is less.

“We thought that’s what had been happening over the last couple of years, and that may in fact be the case, unfortunately this year seems to be a little different we somewhat attribute that to the length of time that the lakes and ponds have been under an ice cover,” said Parker. 

The earth and water have frozen up a little earlier this year, which may have affected things as well. The best time to put oxygen in the water is when it is cool but that wasn’t able to happen this year because the cold weather hit earlier. 

Parker said the smell is not a problem unique to Strathmore; it has also been happening in Calgary and other communities. 

“It seems to be a regular occurrence in storm ponds that the water becomes a little stagnant if the oxygen isn’t high. The decaying matter settles into the base of the lake and then when you get the runoff in the spring that mixes, the decaying matter brings the H2S to the surface and then as it outfalls, brings it out to the environment and localizes it at that point of outfall more or less, That’s really what we’re seeing at Kinsmen,” said Parker. 

EPCOR, the Strathmore Fire Department and the town have been monitoring. The fire hall sampled air quality immediately adjacent from the outfall, where the manhole is for the overflow, and around the lake, and the H2S levels are not registering on the meter, which means at this point there is nothing to be done. 

The town stated in a press release on their website that ‘In the event that H2S concentrations increase to a level that is considered to be of risk, the Town and EPCOR will take necessary steps to resolve the issue and protect the public/residents in the area. At this time, this situation is considered low risk, and more of an inconvenience based on the odour problem.’