Ya Gotta Love It, Now is the EPA listening?
By Brian Wilson

Date: Tue, 31 Jul 2001 11:23:51 -0400>
From: "Wilson, Brian"
Subject: A good use for generic American beer!!

At last! A good use for generic American beer!

Beer offered to clean Tar Creek
By OMER GILLHAM Tulsa World Staff Writer
7/30/01

Tom Harris is stone cold sober when he talks about using stale beer to cleanse the iron-contaminated waters of Tar Creek.

Harris, a University of Tulsa chemistry professor, has conducted laboratory experiments that show that a beer-treated wetland would be far more effective in removing heavy metals from runoff water than an untreated wetland.

When Harris eventually takes his idea to the orange-hued waters of Tar Creek near Picher, Oklahoma he hopes a local beer distributor will donate its expired lager to the project. The distributor, who wishes to remain anonymous, destroys about $200,000 a year in beer that has not been sold by its expiration date. That is hundreds of gallons of old grog going into the Tulsa sewer works each month, said a distributor spokesman.

"The idea kind of fell in my lap at a (cocktail) party," said Harris. "I was talking about using molasses as a (remediation) agent when a friend suggested beer. It struck me as being a remarkable idea."

Harris said the sugar-like molecules in beer promote the growth of a "friendly" bacteria that would have a party on the zinc and lead, flowing into a wetland along Tar Creek -- one of the most urgent EPA Superfund sites in the United States.

Sulfide, the bacteria's byproduct, is a key player in the remediation effort. Harris said the element would latch onto heavy metals and bond them to a wetland's muddy floor thus leaving cleaner water to wash downstream.

He said a beer-treated wetland is a possible low-tech, low-cost solution to just one of the many problems associated with contaminated soil and water caused by decades of zinc mining. "Our research shows that a (beer) wetland could be five to 10 times smaller than a regular wetland and produce many times more of the remediation work," said Harris. However, the strength of the beer-fed bacteria does fade, which means a beer-treated wetland must be loaded up with thousands of gallons of beer periodically.

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