STARK RAVING MAD

Cities with only primary sewage plants must remove 30% of organic material from the sewage, says the National Clean Water Act of 1987. But Anchorage, Alaska, has no organic material in its water. So they buy bones and fish viscera from canneries that or-dinarily go into fertilizers, haul them to and from a reduction plant in another city, then dump the stuff in the water, so that they have something from which to remove 30%. They may still run afoul of the law at break-up time or when the fall floods hit; they may then have such an onslaught of clean water that they will be unable to pollute it sufficiently. [See Paul Harvey column, 8/4/91.