San Francisco has made a big deal about going green, but it turns out that push is also costing the city a lot of green, as in money.
People have complained about a rotten-egg stench near AT&T Park and other places in the city. Turns out the smell is due to the decrease in water usage.
The city has made a big push for the use of low-flow toilets, according to the Chronicle, but that leads to people are using less water. Less water means there is less to dilute the waste in the city's pipes, making the sewage sludgier and causing an odd smell in parts of the city when it's hot.
To combat the problem, the city is spending an extra couple million dollars a year to buy bleach. That kills the smell to some extent. It's on top of the $100 million the city has used over the past five-years to upgrade the sewer system. Some of that money has also gone to fight the smell problem.
Despite the cost, the city says it is worth it. Water usage in the city is down about 20 million gallons a year.
