March 19, 2024

The Million Gallon Question... Polluted Water

Sept. 28, 2008
When the developers of Bay Harbor Resort received the go-ahead to build a resort for the rich on top of an ancient mess of cement kiln dust, the DNR was in a “conundrum.”
The cement kiln dust had tested as inert, meaning that run-off water didn’t pick up known toxins from the cement kiln dust, said Bob Wagner, the DEQ supervisor for the ongoing clean-up at Bay Harbor Resort.
Yet, there were significant red flags. Arsenic-laden water was seeping from two of the piles (cited in a DNR memo of 12/14/94) and samples of cement kiln dust contained elevated levels of heavy metals. There was a Congressional report the year before, which raised serious concerns of the presence of dioxins and furans (among the most toxic of toxins) in kiln dust at 11 former cement production sites across the country.
Critics allege that the DNR’s decision to sign a covenant not to sue in 1994 was given too fast, with too little information. In retrospect, the developers could have saved themselves big headaches now.
Now there’s a plan to take a million gallons of tainted water each week from the contaminated site at Bay Harbor to a proposed injection well in Antrim County.
The only problem is that the well is proposed in the heart of a watershed that feeds the prized Jordan River and three other rivers.
“They are transferring their pollution problem to the Jordan Valley and the river watersheds out here. It’s absurd,” said Ray Bier, an activist and gallery owner.

THE PLAN
When water runs over kiln dust, it turns into leachate—bleach-like water that contains trace amounts of heavy metals, including mercury, arsenic and lead. CMS Land Company has had to set up an elaborate shoreline pipe system to collect the tainted water.
CMS neutralizes the leachate to a normal pH level and then trucks it to the Grand Traverse County Septage Plant, and to a commercial well sited near a trout stream in Johannesburg, a small town outside of Gaylord.
The trips from Petoskey to Traverse City and Johannesburg are costly, so CMS wants to build a deep injection well outside of tiny Alba. Estimated savings would amount to $5 million a year.
Critics fear that government regulators have once again failed to do their homework before approving the well permits in February. The leader of this outcry is a small town veterinarian, John Richter of East Jordan. He’s given to wearing cowboy boots and scrubs to work, where posters opposing the well dot the office walls. He heads up the environmental group, Friends of the Jordan River. Experts have joined the cause and are pitching a credible battle of science.
The Friends group is challenging the permit approvals, but has little hope of success. Richter is quite certain they’ll have to file suit in circuit court to win. The local governments are joining in the legal efforts, but not Tip of the Mitt, a Petoskey environmental group.
On the other side is Tim Petroskey, spokesman of CMS Land Company, the sole developer that got stuck with the multi-million dollar clean-up job.
Here are the pro and con arguments for the injection well.

ENVIRONMENTAL JUSTICE
Anti-well: The EPA must consider environmental justice assessment as part of its well permit approval process. Specifically, the EPA must consider whether this is a case of the rich dumping pollution into the backyard of the poor. Richter believes it’s a clear-cut case. CMS wants to dump toxic water from a posh resort into the backyard of Alba.
Pro-well: Alba was poor, but not poor enough to flag the issue of environmental justice. The EPA criteria says that at least 58% of Alba residents must be low income. “You typically only see those levels in Flint or Detroit,” said Brian Kelly, the Bay Harbor site coordinator for the EPA.
The EPA designed an online socio-economic analysis, which was used by the Beeland Group (a company created by CMS Land Company to execute the well).
The Beeland report does not specify the percentage of poor people in Alba. It raised, but did not resolve the issue, of transferring pollution from rich to poor.
WHY NOT BAY HARBOR?
Anti-well: Critics want CMS to find a way to dispose of the leachate at its source–the Bay Harbor Resort. Bier said he was told by the DEQ lead geologist, Ray Vugrinovich, that a well could be dug in Emmet County, but it would be more expensive. “It’s purely economics of what’s going on here,” complained Bier.
Richter said that the well is not a final solution. It would take literally centuries to drain the kiln dust toxins. CMS has talked about building an on-site processing facility, but he’s never seen anything close to a plan. He fears that if this well goes in, it will open the door for dozens more.
Pro-well: CMS has consistently stated that it desires a local disposal option and continues to work with the EPA and DEQ to identify one, Petroskey said.
“Emmet County (where Bay Harbor is located) is not suitable for a well. I hope the goal of all is to site a well where science demonstrates it can be safe. There is no scientific evidence that Emmet County is suitable, while there’s overwhelming evidence it can be sited in Antrim County,” he said.
Vugrinovich said he couldn’t talk about the potential for a well in Emmet County because the injection well in Alba is currently under appeal and off-limits for discussion.

FAULT LINES?
Pro-well: According to a CMS update, Antrim County was selected not only for its location, but also for its geology.
“More than 100 oil and gas wells and three other disposal wells already are operating within two miles of the CMS Land well site. That shows the area’s geology is suitable for such use,” explains a CMS newsletter.
“In fact, Antrim County is already home to nearly 50 active brine disposal wells, and there also have been more than a dozen new injection well permits issued in Antrim County since early 2006.”
Anti-well: Richter alleges that the studies used to justify the site are flawed because they are based on the success of other injection wells in the area.
“The top DEQ geologist said that given the presence of other injection wells in the area, it ‘suggests’ this is a suitable receiving geologic formation.
“The word ‘suggests’ is not proof. We have consulted four other hydro-geologists and geophysicists who have raised serious questions. They’re concerned about this vetting process because the risks are huge.”
The Beeland Group used an outdated 1992 atlas to conclude that there are “no faults transecting the proposed well location,” wrote Patricia Patterson, who holds a doctorate in geophysics.
Patterson submitted a detailed and technical letter of objection as part of the public comment process.
She complained that Beeland also relied on old data that shows “no mappable faults in the proposed location.
Patterson wrote that a more recent study, funded by the government, showed that the proposed well “appears to lie between what may be two major fault lines running across Antrim County.”
The study reported that the Michigan Basin is extensively faulted and fractured, due, in part, to high fluid pressure from gas operations—an issue in gas-rich Antrim County, Patterson wrote.
Pro-well: Vugrinovich wrote in a DEQ response: “While the bedrock in many areas of the state Michigan Basin is extensively faulted and fractured, there is no evidence that faults exist in the vicinity of the proposed well that would allow fluids to move out of the injection zone into other formations or to the surface. As evidence, one need only look to the oilfield brine disposal wells in Antrim County which have been in use for a number of years with no detectable impact on surface or groundwater.”

HAZARDOUS?
Richter complains that CMS calls the leachate “nonhazardous” and compares leachate to brine injection wells. These are two different animals, he said, because leachate contains unsafe levels of heavy metals. Brine does not.
Richter said that samples of leachate taken in 2004 show that levels of arsenic, mercury and molybdenum exceed what’s called the human noncancer value (the concentration in surface water that is not expected to cause cancer).
“The leachate analyses shows that it has a strong possibility of containing PBBs and PCBs yet they refuse to analyze for it,” Richter said.
PBBs and PCBs were once used in a wide range of products, from transformers to wood floor finishes. These chemicals are in the same family as dioxins and furans and nearly impossible to fully destroy, They build up in body fat of people and remain in the food chain for ages.
Richter believes the old cement site was commonly used as a dumping ground. Richter believes the U.S. Coast Guard conducted an investigation of illegal dumping and is trying to obtain its reports in order to trigger action.
PBBs and PCBs bind chemically with soil and do not mix with water, but there are fears that the contaminated soil could migrate into water.
Pro-well response: The EPA has interviewed people in Bay Harbor and couldn’t find anyone who know of specific instances of dumping. Therefore, it has never tested the site or leachate for PBBs and PCBs.
“We talked with locals, people who worked there. There’s been no evidence that transformers or anything else were dumped there,” said EPA’s Brian Kelly.
Petroskey said that while the leachate contains a trace amount of mercury, it’s 10 times less than what the government considers safe for drinking water. The injection well will be tested to demonstrate its safety before operations ever begin, Petoskey said.

EYEBROW RAISING
Anti-well: Seep 2 is located at the golf course where 80% of the cement kiln dust is located. Interestingly, it has an entirely different work plan outlined in a 2008 EPA document. The leachate can’t be mixed in the force main, through which the leachate is pumped to a holding tank. There are specific orders not to test the leachate for organics (which include PBBs and PCBs)—“Only pH profiling data will be collected from the boreholes.”
Richter said that he is unable to see much of the data on this proposed site, but even the “sanitized” documents such as this one raises eyebrows.
Pro-well: EPA officials could not offer an answer at press time.

TOO RISKY?
Pro-well: Petroskey often repeats an EPA statement that no Class 1 injection wells have failed or contaminated drinking water and irrigation, when the well was sited, constructed and operated according to EPA rules and regulations. (This is relevant because the proposed Alba well is a Class 1 injection well.)
Anti-well: Says Richter: “When you start hearing the devil talk, you recognize it a little better. In fact, a Class 1 well did fail in Romulus in 2006. Some might say that the well didn’t fail because a surface pipe failed, but that’s like me saying the operation was a success, but the patient died. They shut the well down, the owners left town, and the people who battled this well were left with serious contamination.
“You can cite the EPA’s own statistics: 8% to 9% of deep wells have failed.”

NO TRUST
Anti-well: CMS can’t be trusted based on its past performance. Prior to January of 2003, CMS was pumping leachate to the city of Petoskey’s water treatment plant. CMS was cited with numerous violations, including failure to conduct sampling at the required frequency. The effluent also exceeded limitations for pH, mercury, and lead. CMS failed to inform the city of these problems. Moreover, CMS dumped the untreated caustic and toxic leachate into Little Traverse Bay from January 3, 2004 to September 4, 2004, and potentially endangered swimmers with pH levels comparable to bleach, said activist JoAnne Beemon.
Pro-well: While there were operational issues with the original collection line installed more than 10 years ago, CMS has gained considerable expertise in treating and disposing of the collected water and doesn’t anticipate any future abnormal situations, Petroskey said.
“We are currently safely collecting, treating and disposing” an average of 135,000 gallons of water a day … We are committed to conducting all of our activities in a safe manner,” he said.
Petroskey said the public’s intense interest in the issue will provide additional assurances that work is safely performed.

WINTER ACCIDENTS?
Anti-well: With the drastic cut of snow plowing, there’s a risk of transport trucks crashing on icy roads. Trucks will number 10 to 15 each day. The last stretch of the road to Alba is a narrow road with many curves, homes and children.
Pro-well: The leachate is classified the same as raw milk—a hazardous substance—and poses the same type of risk. If a truckload of milk spilled into a trout stream, it could potentially kill the fish, said DEQ’s Wagner
Petroskey said the Alba well will actually increase road safety, because transport trucks will travel half the miles.

The conclusion of this story is there is no conclusion, except there’s no question that the fight will continue. Stakes are high on both sides. Stay tuned.

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