why take away the tanks ?

The tanks are of no use for anything else but this highly toxic and corrosive chemical.

This is a hazardous product to be handled with care. Essentially a poison diluted by our water system. Concentrated its deadly.

Just run the system until the tanks are used up would have been a simple less costly solution.

Pseudoscience wins out.

I think the new mayor & counsel are doing a very good job over what we have seen in the past. Unfortunately Common sense appears to be not very common.

When numbers are given in a vacuum, there’s no frame of reference. The City has chosen to release the cost of disposing of the AWF tanks and left-over chemical, but they have refused over the years, despite FOI requests, to disclose the REAL annual cost of maintaining the CWF system. They have stated that it costs about $50K/year, but that is ONLY the cost of the HFSA. Because HFSA is very corrosive, the lifespan of the components and equipment is very short.

A critique of recent economic evaluations of community water fluoridation
Lee Ko, Kathleen M. Thiessen

The City of Sacramento has been fluoridating its water supplies just over 10 years. Within that time, the actual cost of operating and maintaining the fluoridation systems has proven to be considerably more than the initial estimate. …
“Fluoridating water is a very costly and labor intensive process and requires constant monitoring of fluoride concentrations to ensure proper dosages. … The chemical is very corrosive, so all equipment that is used in the fluoridation process has a very short life expectancy and needs to be replaced frequently. … but also causes frequent and complex system failures.”
This was echoed by Mr. Rene´ Fonseca of Carroll- Boone Water District in Eureka Springs, AR, which was required by a 2011 State mandate to begin CWF (Fonseca, 2012, private communication):
“All of our chemical feed systems require regular maintenance which is routine but fluoride feed equipment often requires replacement and more frequent attention. … I have toured plants and seen in trade publications deteriorating pipes, steel doors and casing, electrical components, etc. THERE ARE MILLIONS OF DOLLARS SPENT YEARLY ON INFRASTRUCTURE DAMAGE CAUSED BY FLUORIDE IN OUR INDUSTRY.” (emphasis mine)
The realities expressed in these two quotes are not the exceptions. A water plant manager in Alberta, Canada, complained that the fumes from the acid etched the glass, paint, and computer screens of the water treatment plant. Seven years after CWF began in 2001, Riverton, Utah, spent nearly $1.2 million for two new buildings ‘‘to get fluoride out of electrical and pump areas.”

What has been the annual cost of maintaining and replacing the CWF system and components, and fixing any damage to the City’s pump stations over, let’s just say, the past 10 years? Will the City, in the spirit of openness and transparency finally disclose THOSE numbers? Councilors, any of you willing to ask this question on behalf of the taxpayers? We have a right to know just how costly this program has been. Until the City provides the residents the actual cost so that these disposal figures can be put into perspective, this is nothing but spin.

@Filtered, as costly as you may think it is be assured there is no tax savings for us the homeowners of PG in decommissioning the system. You will see a property tax increase in the next budget no matter what the savings of not having a fluoridation system is.

“Fluoridating water is a very costly and labor intensive process and requires constant monitoring of fluoride concentrations to ensure proper dosages. … The chemical is very corrosive, so all equipment that is used in the fluoridation process has a very short life expectancy and needs to be replaced frequently. … but also causes frequent and complex system failures.”

What a crock… you can by equipement that can take the use/abuse of the chemical.. Also with the instream analysers you control the strenght up to parts per billion is you want..

Our city does the same thing.. try to save money by cheaping out and it really costs more in the long run.. Purchase the right equipement, set up a preventitive maintenance program and it will run for years with minor repairs need if any..

THere is a good post on the Citizen by someone about getting rid of this stuff it and all the factors included..

Council decided on the occasion of the 2014 Dec Council meeting to discontinue water fluoridation, and it did. The piping and valves have already been removed. The Council also voted and agreed to remove all the associated equipment, and it is about to do it, as promised.

B.C. is 99% artificial water fluoridation free. Get used to it. The people voted. Respect the vote! The remaining 1% will follow the lead, rest assured!

Also since all this equipement was removed then it must be cleaned and made sure it is good for disposal or recycled.. If it cant be cleaned well enough then it will need special disposal which is very costly to do. Flouridation is gone..but we arent done with the associated costs just yet…

Did it cost $140,000.00 to get the chemical here? I think not.