Clean water advocates are raising concerns about statewide pollution levels in drinking water, Western New York has some of the state’s highest totals.
Buffalo Sewer Authority seeing the third-most gallons of leachate waste, according to a new report by New York River Watch. More than 47 million gallons of contaminated water flowed from Bird Island Wastewater Treatment Plant into Niagara River annually, from 2019 to 2023. Leachate is toxic liquid that results when water flows through landfills or other contamination sources.
Landfills can work around permit requirements by sending the garbage water to treatment plants, but those plants are designed to catch human waste, not runoff from landfills,
NY River Watch Director of Science Jen Epstein said.
“We have built system that requires landfills to contain their toxic leachate, only to allow that same pollution to be discharged through sewage treatment plants, often into drinking water supplies,” she said.
Jamestown has the fifth-highest totals, with 30.5 million gallons “garbage water” flowing into Cassadaga Creek.
About 532 million total gallons of leachate waste flowed annually across New York from 2019 to 2023, according to the report, and more than 150 million gallons of that flowed into drinking water.
The increasing number of data centers, like those already in Western New York, only adds to the wastewater concerns, Seneca Lake Guardian Vice President Yvonne Taylor said.
“Depending on the system that the company uses, there are PFAS contaminants in the wastewater from these facilities as well," she said. "So certainly, it's another angle, another issue, another wrinkle that we're looking into and addressing, and yes, it adds to the problem.”
