What appears on its face to be a routine request for Florida Department of Environmental Protection renewal of an existing wastewater permit for a company that has operated in Pace for many years has turned controversial.
Taminco, a subsidiary of Eastman Chemical, has requested to continue to be allowed to discharge up to 1.23 million gallons a day of wastewater into Escambia Bay in the event of a 25-year storm event, a term that puts the probability of such a storm at 4% each year.
The problem, as environmental activists see it, is that the chemical processing plant now operating at 4575 U.S. Highway 90 in Pace as Taminco U.S. LLC has already done considerable damage to the environment, and by extension the local population, over its many years of operation. County Property Appraiser records indicate the U.S. 90 site had been approved for heavy industrial uses as far back as 1968.
Spotty environmental record
Records indicate the plant operators, which before Taminco and Eastman Chemicals was called Air Products and Chemicals, have faced legal challenges over the years as a result of pollution discharges. Those include a legal settlement to minor children apparently harmed by releases from the plant.
Another set of lawsuits, filed in 2001 and settled in 2006, blamed five deaths and injuries to some 260 people on accidental chemical releases.
“The settlement contemplates payment of certain sums,” a federal court document states in reference to the brokering of a deal in the 2001 case.
Retired Lt. Col. Carmen Reynolds appears to have been the first to alert locals about this year’s recent request for the permit extension.
Reynolds has sent an email to Elizabeth Orr, the Northwest Florida Director of the state’s Department of Environmental Protection, asking for information about two plumes that had been discovered in the ground in East Milton in the early 2000’s.
The plumes, which covered an estimated six square miles of groundwater within one-half mile of two Pace Water System wells, were found to contain dinitrotoluene (DNT), a carcinogen that Air Products and Chemicals produced in Pace until 1973.
“I am writing to ask about the Groundwater Monitoring for the above DNT Plumes found in the early 2000s where people were moved away from the contamination, others were sick, birth defects, cancer clusters,” Reynolds said in the email to Orr.
“The county went to Congressman Jeff Miller and Sen. Bill Nelson to ask for help in determining why residents were sick,” Reynolds said in the email. “They lobbied the US Congress and got funding for UWF’s Center for Environmental Diagnostics & Bioremediation to study the area. They commenced with surveys, medical histories. Cancer clusters were identified and the common thread was finally found—the drinking water.”
EPA came in and mandated the closure of three Pace Water Wells, one of them at Avalon-Mulat (which is open now), Reynolds said in the email. “Today, one can find no one to provide updated information on the location of the plumes or whether there are more.”
A woman who answered the phone June 11 at Pace Water System said General Manager Damon Boutwell and other company officials were at a conference and unavailable to comment for this story.
Liz Pavelick, a representative of the Save Our Soundside organization, and Abbey Rodamaker have joined Reynolds in contacting Orr to voice displeasure.
They’ve called upon DEP to conduct a public hearing at which Taminco officials must be present to provide information about present day company operations and justify the need for the permit they are seeking.
“As citizens, we deserve to know what’s going on in our community and into our water,” Rodamaker said.
Chemical plant wastewater treatment
According to the application to allow it to continue discharging wastewater into the bay during heavy rain events, Taminco oversees five chemical producing plants, four of which send water used in production through a wastewater treatment system. Rodamaker said the land-based treatment facilities are comprised of rapid infiltration ponds and percolation tanks.
Taminco US LLC Pace has mostly stayed out of the news for the last decade. Some credit that to Kingsport, TN-based Eastman Chemical Co. which acquired Taminco in December of 2014.
According to numbers compiled by the Environmental Protection Agency’s Toxics Release Inventory between 1990 and 2015, Air Product and Chemicals/Taminco released 81.5 million pounds of pollutants from its sites. In 2005 alone the poundage reached nearly two million pounds.
As of the time Eastman Chemicals purchased Taminco, though, the pollutant release levels had been significantly reduced. A much lower 94,100 pounds of pollutants were released in 2015.
Numbers released more recently show increases. The Toxic Release Inventory reported releases had risen to 141,000 in 2019 and to 210,000 by 2023.
Efforts to reach a spokesman at the Pace plant were not successful.
At the time of the Eastman Chemical acquisition, Taminco was being blamed for a stench that most residents were convinced was coming from the plant.
After a series of articles ran in the Pensacola News Journal, a South Florida law firm sent letters of inquiry out to people living in the vicinity of the chemical plant as it contemplated filing a class action lawsuit. The stories revealed that noxious odors emanating from the plant were something residents living near to the plant have been suffering with for three decades.
Chemicals that smell bad and irritate eyes and skin
The plant produces more methylamine than anywhere on the planet, according to an Eastman Chemical produced video touting the Pace plant’s environmental stewardship and emphasis on safety. It has or does also produce dimethylamine and trimethylamine.
According to the National Institute of Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH), each of these chemicals produces similar symptoms in humans.
Methylamine can cause irritation to eyes, skin, respiratory system; cough; skin, mucous membrane burns; dermatitis; conjunctivitis; liquid: frostbite. Dimethylamine has been linked to irritation to the nose, throat; sneezing, cough, dyspnea (breathing difficulty); pulmonary edema; conjunctivitis and dermatitis.
Trimethylamine is an organic compound and a gas at room temperature.
Anhydrous ammonia, another chemical produced at the plant, can cause serious burning of eyes, nose and throats, even in small amounts, according to the Center for Disease Control and Prevention.
From Feb. 28, 2012, to Jan. 4, 2015, the DEP has investigated eight chemical leaks at the plant, of which five were related to the No. 4 plant. Additionally, DEP cited Taminco with two air-related noncompliance violations.
Justifying the overflow allowances
Orr responded to an email from Pavelick to “provide a little context about the permit currently under review.”
“This is a renewal of an existing wastewater permit for a facility that has operated at this location for many years,” her email said. “It is not a permit for a new facility, nor does it authorize an expansion of the wastewater treatment system or an increase in the facility’s permitted treatment capacity.”
Noting that the treated wastewater discharges would only occur following a 25-year, 24-hour rain event, Orr notified Pavelick that the chemical plant had not reported a discharge to Escambia Bay since October 2021.
The permit requires extensive monitoring, reporting, groundwater monitoring, and toxicity testing requirements, Orr said.
“Based on our review of the application and supporting information, the department determined that the applicant provided reasonable assurance that the facility can continue to operate in accordance with applicable state and federal requirements,” Orr said in the email.
Orr went on to discuss the public comment options regarding permits like the one that is being contemplated for Taminco.
“Interested persons are welcome to submit comments or request a public meeting on the proposed permit as outlined in the public notice,” the email said.
Call for public hearing on Taminco permit
Rodamaker, who became extremely well versed in navigating DEP records when she and her husband discovered Gulf Breeze land they’d bought for their dream home sat atop an old landfill site, said she had filled out a request for public hearing on the Taminco permit, and doing so is not for the weak of heart.
“The overall site is hard to get through, it requires an asinine amount of information when requesting a public hearing,” she said.
Rodamaker said the request includes requiring a petitioner for public hearing to cite statutes under which the request for public hearing is being sought. She used the Clean Water Act as one provision in statute for holding the hearing.
“We have a constellation of environmental concerns, and the public needs to have an opportunity to meet and discuss the permit and the company,” Rodamaker said. “Escambia Bay has been in trouble for years, and we don’t want to have more percolation overflow.”
It is her belief, Rodamaker said, that Taminco should be fined for the discharges even in the event of severe weather causing overflows.
“That would allow us to do everything we need to do on the back end to make sure the water is safe,” she said. “This is letting these companies just get away with this.”
Rodamaker said Orr had acknowledged receipt of her public hearing request and a decision is pending on whether to hold a meeting.
“It will depend on how many requests they get,” she said. “We’re hoping enough people will reach out.”
Florida Department of Environmental Protection spokeswoman Arielle Glass said DEP has received five requests from stakeholders for DEP to host a public meeting regarding the renewal of Taminco’s wastewater permit.
“DEP is currently reviewing the public meeting requests and has yet to make a formal decision on whether a public meeting will be held,” she said.
This article originally appeared on Pensacola News Journal: Pace neighbors demand public hearing over Taminco chemical plant
Reporting by Tom McLaughlin, Pensacola News Journal / Pensacola News Journal
USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect
By Tom McLaughlin, Pensacola News Journal | USA TODAY Network
