Comment Extension for Lab USA EAW & Xcel & Lab USA Solid Waste!
January 13th, 2017
Ask and you shall receive, eh? I’d not checked on this, was buried in other stuff this week, but LOOK!
YES! this is good because the MPCA did not release the primary documents until December 30, 2016, and there’s no excuse for denying the public time to review the Application, etc.
Once more with feeling, here are the Comments I’d filed on behalf of the Tyler Hills Neighbors on January 4, 2017, and Comments of Indian Affairs Council and Minnesota Department of Administration:
Comments -_Tyler Hills Neighbors & Exhibits
Comment Letter – Indian Affairs Council
Comment Letter – Dept of Administration
Note the photo at the top of this post — the Lab USA site is contiguous to the City of Red Wing’s laydown yard and crusher — and it wants to build its laydown yard and crusher on a lot that overlaps the Water Tank Mounds. Ummmm, no, I don’t think so!
I’m looking forward to seeing any additional comments filed by the end of the month.
A little birdie told me that there is a Red Wing business that could use “cleaned” ash, and I’d guess there are at least two… it seems the logical thing to do is to put Lab USA’s facility at this other business site, and everyone would be happy! Well, not everyone, but it seems a better fit. This is something the City should look into, because now that the City isn’t doing any “ash mining,” their dog in this has been neutered. We shall see…
TOMORROW – Silica Sand Tech Assistance Team Mtg.
January 4th, 2017
January 5, 2017 – 2:30pm
Silica Sand Technical Assistance Team Meeting
January 5th, 2017 @ 2:30pm in the DNR Central Office Lobby Conference Room.
Meet to discuss technical and agency updates to the EQB Tools to Assist Local Governments in Planning for and Regulating Silica Sand Projects, agency rulemaking updates, and updates on silica sand activities in the State of Minnesota
Conference call: 1-888-742-5095 | Conference Code: 3649223869#
Agenda:
1) Introductions
2) Agency updates on silica sand activities in the State of Minnesota
3) Technical and agency updates to EQB Tools to Assist Local Governments in Planning for and Regulating Silica Sand Projects
4) Agency updates on rulemaking
a. DNR
b. MPCA
c. EQB
5) EQB Ordinance Library
6) Other topics
7) Adjourn
Show up — keep the heat on to get these projects MOVING! It’s been YEARS!
December 7 – Red Wing Ash Mine Open House
December 1st, 2016
There’s a plan afoot here in Red Wing that strikes me as one of the more bizarre ideas, particularly given the subsidy the City of Red Wing is giving to Xcel Energy by leasing land from Xcel Energy for the term of Xcel’s own “ash mining” project and about 10 years beyond. WHAT?
On Monday, the Pollution Control Agency will release the EAW and you’ll be able to find it HERE AT THIS LINK.
This PR blurb was issued recently by the Red Wing Chamber of Commerce, in support of the project:
Community Meeting to Share Information About Proposed Project to Process Ash and Recycle Metals from Xcel Energy’s Red Wing RDF Landfill – December 7 | 5PM-7PM | Red Wing Public Library.Please join Lab USA and the City of Red Wing for a community meeting to learn more about a potential project that would process ash and recycle metals from Xcel Energy’s RDF landfill in Red Wing. Lab USA has proposed to build, own, and operate an environmentally-responsible ash processing facility that would be located next to the existing Xcel RDF landfill in Red Wing. The project will recover and recycle high quantities of iron and non-iron metals from ash in the landfill that was created by Xcel Energy’s Red Wing Generating Plant and from existing ash at Xcel Energy’s RDF landfill.The community meeting is another step in Lab USA’s ongoing work to secure permits and approvals and to reach out to the Red Wing community.
* Lab USA has completed a voluntary Environmental Assessment Worksheet (EAW) that shows the project will comply with rules and regulations related to noise, emissions, and other impacts.
* People from Lab USA, Xcel Energy, and the City of Red Wing will be at the meeting to answer questions and talk about the project, how the ash processing works, and how this project can benefit Red Wing.
This project is also a unique way for Red Wing to take its commitment to sustainable environmental stewardship to a new level by creating both economic and environmental benefits for City of Red. It will remove and recycle metals from the landfill, generate new revenue for the city, and create jobs as the project moves forward.The meeting will also include a chance to learn more about EAW for the project and to share comments and feedback with Lab USA and the City of Red Wing. The public comment period for the EAW begins December 5th. The Red Wing City Council is expected to vote to approve the project in February of 2017. For more information please contact labusaredwing@gmail.com
To be clear, the Monday meeting is hosted by Lab USA and is an “open house” format and is not a formal hearing. The public comment period is for 30 days, until January 4, and I’l publish details on where to send the comments after the Notice is issued. After January 4, 2017, there will be a determination of whether an Environmental Impact Statement is necessary, and remember, in recent history, the MPCA Board has only ordered ONE EIS, and after that one EIS, the MPCA Citizens Board was unceremoniously disbanded! The odds of a declaration that an EIS is needed are zilch, zip, nada, ZERO.
The EAW will be released on Monday, FIND IT HERE, per Dan Card at the MPCA:
Kevin Kain is the environmental review project manager for the proposed Lab USA project.
The reason you couldn’t find the EAW on our website is because it hasn’t been placed on public notice yet. That will occur next Monday Dec 5, 2016 which starts the 30 day public comment period. You will find EAW posted next Monday at the bottom of https://www.pca.state.mn.us/quick-links/environmental-assessment-worksheets-and-environmental-impact-statements under Environmental Assessment Worksheets.
The company will be hosting an Open House and Kevin along with other solid waste permitting staff plan on attending.
What’s the deal?
Here are the documents I have, in chronological order for the most part, some are duplicates produced for the procedural step that followed:
- 8c2 – attachment – 11-09-15workshopminutes
- January-28-2016-storm water design material storage laydown area 9b – attachment
- 07- Public Works Maintenance Yard CUP – APC 3-15-16 (contains application)
- 06- Minutes – APC 3-15-2016_approved 4-19-16
- 09c1 Xcel Lease Agreement CC 04-25-2016
- 09c2-LabUSA Letter CC 04-25-2016
- April 25, 2016 CC Minutes
- May 9, 2016 CC Minutes
- May 9, 2016_9b – attachment (see January 28, above)
- 12- Status Report APC 5-17-16
So what is this, the short version?? It’s a plan to “mine” the incinerator ash in the City of Red Wing landfill. There’s a link to formally closing the dump, and I think that by doing this, the city takes a step toward that formal closure, one pushed by the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency. But mining the ash? The plan is for the City of Red Wing to hire a company, Lab USA, to “mine” the ash and remove salable materials from it.
Now here’s where it gets really weird. The City of Red Wing’s planned part of this project lasts one year. Xcel Energy, which has its own incinerator dump here, plans to do the same, and its part of the project lasts 11 years. And the City of Red Wing signed a lease with Xcel Energy to do this project for 20 years. TWENTY YEARS? WHAT?!?! Here are the details…
The City staff has stressed the underlying Red Wing goal of landfill closure through the state’s “Closed Landfill Program.” When presented at the 11/9/2015 workshop (See 8c2-attachment -_11-09-15_Workshop_Minutes), there was “potential” for a sublease, and now that’s presumed. Red Wing’s Public Works has pressure from the MPCA to close its landfill, and also from Xcel because Red Wing “does not have enough ash to support this project as a stand alone project.” In other words, it’s dependent on Xcel to do this “project.” RW Public Works’s Moskwa admits that “the Xcel Energy landfill ash is the primary reason for the Lab USA’s interest in submitting a proposal.” (See p. 5, March 22. 2016, Sustainability Commission MeetingMinutes).
The City of Red Wing project would last just 1 year, and Xcel Energy’s share would last 10-11 years. (Lease, p. 17 of pdf: May 9, 2016_9b – attachment) Yet the City of Red Wing is leasing Lots 1 and 2 from Xcel Energy for 20 years! Given that disparity, the reasons for the lease/sublease arrangement with the City of Red Wing, Xcel, and Lab USA, rather than Lab USA taking on the lease, are not clear. Because there are three parties in this, that provides some measure of inherent instability in the project, and because Lab USA has no history in Minnesota, they’ll receive higher scrutiny, one would hope. On the other hand, the City of Red Wing seems to have yet another deal with Xcel Energy, where they’ve taken on a lease of land from Xcel for the City yard (for what purpose?) and that also includes lease of the land for this project and then the City plans to sublease to Lab USA (for the one year, for 11 years, for 20 years?), but yet the lion’s share of term of the project is the 10-11 years for Xcel, not the 1 year for Red Wing. So why is the City of Red Wing buying into this, subsidizing this, so heavily? To induce Xcel to do it? Some other reason?
With the lease for both lots already signed, the project is moving forward, and that’s a problem. How is this a good deal for the City of Red Wing? Is anyone paying attention?
Further, calling this project an allowed use, as “Public Works Maintenance Shops and Yards,” is a stretch. I’m not seeing any change from Agricultural Residential (AR) designation in the Comp Plan, and see statements that “Outlot A” was removed from the Tyler Hills PUD, Applications for Lot 1 and Lot 2 both denote Zoning as “AR.” I don’t see a change from AR to anything else. The Application includes “Proposed Tyler Hills Fourth Addition” and the lease boundary doesn’t match up with Outlot A, and Figures 1 and 2 don’t match up with the proposed plat. Details, anyone?
Other issues with the project itself?
- There’s traffic… “24 trucks/day” means 48 truck trips per day, or 24 trucks assigned to the area to make many trips back and forth and back and forth from the landfill to the building — this needs to be clarified, and impacts addressed. And these trucks are in addition to currently running Xcel garbage burner ash trucks and in addition to RW’s Lot 1 “Public Works Maintenance Shops and Yards” trucks that will be at least an additional 15-30 pickups and trucks per day.
- There’s sound… The homes directly north, west, and southwest are above, with this project situated down in a hole — and sound travels up. The “CUP Sound Study” is for the RW crusher, and does not take into account the Lab USA operation, so how does the EAW address that?
- There’s dust… From Mark Walsworth, who notes that “one of the items left out is just how much hazardous material that will be produced annually is not mentioned…all of it dust, and that by themselves, these numbers should scare anyone! Also notably missing is ANY plan or equipment to keep these from escaping to the environment.”
Lead 519,000 lbs
Cadmium 8,400 lbs
Chrome 51,000 lbs
Arsenic 6,000 lbs
Manganese 156,000 lbs
Nickel 24,600 lbs
Selenium 1,500 lbs
Mercury 600 lbs
- On and on…
Here are two Letters to the Editor written by Alan Muller about this:
LTE Muller – Mining Incinerator Ash is Foolish Idea 12-10-2015
LTE_Muller – Incinerator ash plan and actions behind it are toxic 3-31-2016
We need to take a look at that EAW (remember, it’s prepared by the applicant/project proponent) and see what is revealed, what is considered, and what’s left out.
Peaking gas generator for Rochester
July 6th, 2016
Way back during the CapX 2020 proceeding, it became clear that Rochester Public Utilities planned to build gas generation just west of town, at the “Westside” site. But this was downplayed, and ignored by the ALJ, because it would be evidence that CapX 2020 wasn’t “needed.” And of course demand was way down, which we knew but which was also ignored, and that was one more reason CapX 2020 wasn’t needed. The Rochester gas generation was delayed.
But recently they announced the new gas pipeline around the city, and now, the gas plant. Today, from the MPCA:
Intent to Construct Air Emission Permit for Rochester Public Utilities Westside
PUBLIC NOTICE – 10901028-101 – 2016.pdf
DRAFT PERMIT – 10901028-101 – 2016.pdf
TSD – 10901028-101 – 2016.pdf
Open for public comment through Thursday, August 4, 2016
MPCA requests/expects certain things to be addressed in Comments, “you must state” per the MPCA:
(1) Your interest in the permit application or the draft permit.
(2) The action you wish the MPCA to take, including specific references to the section of the draft permit you believe should be changed.
(3) The reasons supporting your position, stated with sufficient specificity as to allow the MPCA to investigate the merits of the position.
Send Comments to:
Rachel Yucuis
Industrial Division
Minnesota Pollution Control Agency
520 Lafayette Rd
St. Paul, MN 55155
Phone: 651-757-2863
Email: rachel.yucuis@state.mn.us
And another MPCA listening session
March 10th, 2016
And last night in Rochester, more of the MPCA “Clean Power Plan” listening sessions. This one was less well attended that Monday’s in Minneapolis, but packed into a much smaller, almost claustrophobic sized room. Many concerns were raised, in large part because the “Clean Power Plan” remains a mystery — there is no MPCA plan for us to check out and comment on, and the federal Supreme Court put the EPA’s plan on hold.
The MPCA has been meeting with “stakeholders” which is primarily utilities, with a few energy wonks also attending — see this link, and scroll down for meetings and materials:
A turnout of this size, both last night and the night before, means that yes, people are interested and concerned, and I hope everyone stays in the loop and participates.