With standing room only, residents, environmentalists and local officials from Pennsylvania and New Jersey packed a Sheraton Bucks County Hotel meeting room on March 5 to voice their concerns over Elcon Recycling Services LLC’s proposal to build a liquid hazardous waste storage and processing facility.
The facility is planned to be constructed in Pennsylvania’s Falls Township, which is in Bucks County.
Elcon Recycling Services LLC, a hazardous waste processing company, is currently applying for permits to build a treatment facility in the Keystone Industrial Port Complex, located several miles away from Bordentown and Florence.
Among the local officials who were in attendance were the Deputy Mayor of Bordentown City, John Brodowski, and Keith Ornsdorff of the Bordentown City Environmental Commission.
As concerned attendees commiserated with a panel of representatives from the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection (DEP)’s Waste Management, Air Quality and Clean Water programs, the reps informed and fielded questions from individuals about the proposed facility’s planned operations and most updated information about the multi-phase application process.
Now in its fourth year of proposal after several denials in which application materials were rejected by DEP, the agency stated in July that Elcon had provided all the required documents and that it would engage in a 10-month technical review.
If the review is cleared by May, Elcon could potentially import up to 194,000 tons of hazardous waste annually by truck or rail, and burn more than a million pounds of waste a day using thermal oxidation.
When Bordentown officials held a cross-river public meeting regarding Elcon’s proposed project on Oct. 10 last year, officials pointed out that given strong northwest and westerly winds in the region, air pollution from the facility would potentially blow toward Bordentown and Florence.
To date, Elcon has applied to the DEP for a Solid Waste Management Permit for a Commercial Hazardous Waste Treatment and Storage Facility, an Air Quality Plan Approval, and a General Stormwater Discharge permit.
Elcon submitted a solid waste management permit application for a commercial hazardous waste treatment facility to DEP. After a series of administrative completeness reviews, the DEP found the application to be administratively complete and commenced a 10-month technical review in July 2018.
Elcon also applied for an Air Quality Plan Approval as a minor facility and a General Stormwater Discharge permit in October 2018. The application for air quality has been deemed administratively complete and is currently under technical review. The review ensures that the facility will meet all applicable rules and regulations, as well as meeting the best available technology, for any air pollution sources and any associated air pollution control equipment.
The application for stormwater discharge has been deemed administratively complete, and the application is currently under technical review. National Pollutants Discharge Elimination System (NPDES) permits and best management practices are used to control stormwater runoff and pollution prevention. This permit would be limited to stormwater discharges only.
Opponents of the plan worry that any on-site accidents could cause hazardous materials to make their way into the Delaware River, since the facility is slated to use the waterway. In addition, opponents are concerned that any of the approximately 17 to 25 trucks transporting waste throughout the region each day could potentially get into an accident at the treatment facility, leaking hazardous waste into the river.
Opponents also worried that waste transported by rail is expected to travel within 200 feet of wetlands and waterways connected to the Delaware River. Any spill or accident could result in the waste contaminating the river.
The Delaware River serves as a drinking water supply for approximately eight million people in the surrounding area.
Given the proposed treatment facility’s proximity to Bordentown and Florence, representatives from Bordentown were on hand at the meeting to discuss their stance on the issue, and how to approach the matter.
With the foremost question among opposers at the meeting being, “How could the DEP allow a facility like this to be built so close to a dense population in one half-mile from the water supply for millions of people?” multiple reps from the DEP spoke out in regards to the technicalities of Elcon’s proposal and applications.
“The DEP doesn’t have any control over local zoning issues, so the general notion that the DEP is allowing it to be built in this particular location is incorrect because the Keystone Industrial Port complex – if it’s zoned to allow heavy industry, that’s a local issue,” said DEP regional spokeswoman, Virginia Cain.
Following her response, Cain turned the question over to the DEP’s regional manager for the waste management program, James Wentzel, for further explanation.
“In phase one, (the DEP) looked at what’s called the ‘Exclusionary Citing Criteria,’ that are in the department’s regulations for citing a commercial treatment or storage facility,” Wentzel said. “There are different requirements for a disposal facility, which would be a facility looking to dispose of hazardous waste onto or into land, which (the Keystone Industrial Port Complex) is not this facility.
“This is a treatment and storage facility, so the phase one stage for treatment and storage facilities, by regulation, we’re limited to only look at certain environmental issues such as, ‘Is the facility located in a 100-year floodplain? Is the facility located in a wetland? Is it located in or near certain national landmarks or historic places? Is the facility located on public lands? Is the facility located in an agricultural area? Is it located in an exceptional value watershed?’ The facility is not located in any of those areas.”
Although Wentzel’s explanation was met with much dismay from opposing attendees in the room, he noted that there are still multiple factors still under review in Elcon’s application.
“That’s what we can look at for phase one. As part of the part B application, the current technical part of the application, there are phase two criteria in the regulations. They’re not exclusionary criteria, however, there are criteria that look at more of an environmental assessment of the facility,” he said. “It looks at things such as land use because the facility is determined to be compliant with existing zoning. It is deemed satisfied with the land use criteria in our regulations.”
As DEP reps fielded more questions from alarmed locals and officials, Brodowski spoke up at the meeting to inquire about site cleanup efforts at the proposed facility’s location as well as to where hazardous waste from the facility would be transported to.
“Our community is only about two miles from the proposed site – we get all the prevailing winds that blow across the (Delaware River),” Brodowski reiterated to the DEP reps.
Wentzel said Elcon’s application materials limit it to not taking radioactive, reactive, fracking, or solid PCB waste, as well as no dioxin or cyanide waste.
Officials said any residual waste would be treated as hazardous and taken to certified landfills and that nearby landfills are not allowed to take such waste, but that they could not yet control which certified landfills the waste would be taken to.
Later on in the meeting, the other Bordentown City representative, Orsndorff, questioned the technicalities of the DEP’s application review process as well as voiced his concerns with the potential risks of the influx waste potentially being produced at the facility.
“You’ve got an amount of materials coming in close proximity, or at least in large measure – you’re creating a generation of hazardous waste that is beyond what is necessary for a viable hazardous waste treatment facility,” Orsndorff said. “The real added value to the environmental protection of the regulations this calls for, adding the approval of a hazardous waste treatment plant – it turns itself into a major generator of hazardous waste.”
With Elcon’s three applications under review before the DEP, a proposed recommendation from them on the waste application is anticipated by late May. The DEP said this opens a public comment period, after which they will have a discretionary amount of time to create a response document that would be published with their final decision.
The DEP said it has plans to coordinate their decisions on the air and water permits to coincide with the waste permit.
Although Cain said there are no requirements for any additional public hearings, the DEP could choose to hold one if they deem it necessary.
For people seeking more information or looking to get involved with the matter, visit www.stopelcon.com, www.delawareriverkeeper.org or www.dep.pa.gov.
