Vacuuming blue-green algae blooms from St. Lucie River should start Friday

Tyler Treadway | Treasure Coast Newspapers

PALM CITY — A contractor hired by Martin County plans to start sucking blue-green algae blooms Friday out of the St. Lucie River.

The site will depend on where a crew from Aecom, a Boca Raton-based company heading the project, and Sea Tow Treasure Coast in Jensen Beach, which owns the boat to be used, can find a suitable algae bloom.

"It's got to be a mat of algae," said Diane Hughes, the county's senior ecosystem specialist. "There's algae throughout the entire St. Lucie estuary, but there's no way we can effectively vacuum up streaks of algae or flecks in the water."

"We're focusing on blooms that are causing obnoxious odors to businesses or residents," Hughes added, "smells that are making people sick."

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Aecom has been scooping up algae in Lee County on Florida's Gulf Coast for two weeks, said Robert G. Cooper, the company's vice president for environmental services.

"We've worked at several marinas, including the Cape Coral Yacht Club, and some residential canals," Cooper said, "and it's been very effective."

Here's how the system will work:

A specially designed Sea Tow boat equipped with a powerful vacuum pump and a 500-gallon holding tank will set out fiberglass floats designed by Wilson McQueen of Shoreline Slime & Algae Removal in Jensen Beach.

The floats, connected to the boat by flexible tubes, will skim the water and collect the algae, which will be sucked into the boat's tank.

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McQueen said his patented system allows a large amount of algae to be sucked up without a lot of water.

In cases where there's a nearby road, the algae can be sucked directly into large tanker trucks.

The algae will be hauled to a county wastewater treatment plant in Jensen Beach and mixed with chlorine in large storage tanks to kill any toxins.

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Once solids are separated from liquids, the solids will be hauled to the Okeechobee landfill.

The water will be processed until it's clean enough to drink, Cooper said, before it's injected into a 3,000-foot-deep well with brine, a saltwater byproduct of wastewater treatment that's already being sent down the wells.

The county also wants to stop the flow of algae in the C-44 Canal connecting Lake O and the river.

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Plans call for stretching booms and curtains from each of the two piers beneath the 96th Street Bridge to the canal's north and south shores. Because algae tends to flow along the banks of the canal, the equipment will catch algae but leave the canal's main channel open for boat traffic.

As the algae builds up behind the booms, it will be pumped out of the river, into tanker trucks and disposed of just like the algae collected by boat.

The county received a $700,000 state grant, part of $3 million set aside for algae cleanup assistance to counties affected by the blooms.

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The cost of the algae vacuuming project will depend on how much algae is sucked up, said John Maehl, the county's ecosystem manager.

The county has spent $50,000 so far to buy equipment that can be used in subsequent bloom events, Maehl said.

To seek county help in cleaning up an algae bloom, go to martin.fl.us/AlgaeRemoval.

More: TCPalm's complete coverage of the algae crisis

More: Algae blooms reported throughout St. Lucie River

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