City to work with Actus Nutrition on reducing discharge levels | Select

The Norfolk City Council tabled consideration of raising the fine amount for a permit with dairy processing company Actus Nutrition for exceeding water waste discharge levels and setting a slug level.

City engineer Steven Rames said a permit for Actus Nutrition (formerly Milk Specialties Co./Milk Specialties Global) was created last October to control various levels, such as biochemical oxygen demand (BOD), total suspended solids (TSS) and total Kjeldahl nitrogen (TKN).

BOD measures the amount of oxygen needed for microorganisms to break down waste. TSS measures the amount of undissolved solids in the water. TKN measures the total amount of nitrogen and ammonia in the water.

Wastewater is required to have specific levels for each parameter to keep it at a safe level. Each parameter is measured by the city as pounds, and companies pay a fee for the pounds they produce. Those pounds pass through the water treatment plant in the city, which is everything from residential to industrial wastewater.

The permit for Actus Nutrition sets a daily penalty to $1,000 per day for surpassing the required levels of these parameters. However, since its implementation, there have been 280 permit violations, mostly with BOD and TSS.

July saw 10 consecutive days of excessive loads, with some being 15 pounds. Per Rames, the waste management plant is still in recovery from dealing with that.

Rames explained in a later interview that the plant can only handle a certain amount of pounds per day. Repeated days of excessive pounds can be harmful to the plants capacity, affecting everything from it’s filters to the bugs and organisms that help break down the waste.

He said he feels that given the number of permit violations, the penalty number does not appear to be excessive enough, and he put forth the idea to increase the permit fine amount as well as clearly define the penalty as $20,000 per day. Also, if a slug discharge is implemented, the company would be fined if it exceeds the limit by more than 8%.

“We are recommending a fairly substantial increase in that daily penalty for each of those loadings so we are able to better keep them within their permits,” Rames said.

Council member Kory Hildebrand asked if controlling the amount of slug loads would help quell the smell near Omaha Avenue. Rames said it could potentially help, adding that Actus Nutrition has been investing in pretreatment processing and more.

“I believe they have the ability to manage that load and if done so, those odors would be substantially reduced,” Rames said.

The proposed permit increase would kick in immediately and being over by 1 pound potentially could trigger that $20,000 fine, though it could be discussed.

Rames said the city worked with Actus Nutrition to find a permit solution that worked for the company and the city. Rames has met with dairy industry members to suggest plant expansion and pretreatment ideas.

Zoran Vrebec, Actus Nutrition’s West Coast vice president and operations manager, said that because the company has a wastewater tank on the property and because it deals with dairy, the odor is always going to be present.

Vrebec said he understands the factory has to do better but since he’s been in charge, it’s moved to improve how it does things.

Vrebec said the big problem is the company doesn’t have enough power to put in some of the equipment suggested by the city to reduce the amount of slug load discharge.

Vrebec said the company tries to follow the permit rules, but sometimes the building loses power or the water from the city stops running, causing the equipment to stop working and causing discharge with excess BOD.

He argued that while he knows the company can’t afford to continue the same way it has, the proposed daily fine increase could shut the plant down. He urged finding a middle ground between the city and the company.

“I just can’t keep affording to pay, that thing will shut us down. … That will get us out of the city. We can’t afford to pay that,” Vrebec said.

He said that because of the nature of working with dairy products, he couldn’t give a specific amount of waste discharged per day.

“We’ve got to be able to work with a bit of variation,” Vrebec said. “It’s not a science where I can tell ‘I’m going to discharge 6,000 every day.’ It doesn’t work that way.”

Vrebec added that every time he thinks he’s figured it out, something sets the project back. He said Actus Nutrition is one of few companies that processes dairy in the area and he can’t just shut the company down to accommodate for potential discharge overflow.

Rames said that not being made aware ahead of time of discharge overflow has the potential to affect the city equipment and the permit with the city.

“We are still recovering some three weeks later from that 10-day series of hits,” Rames said. “So it’s very real, and if that was to continue, our plant’s capacity just continues to decline.”

Robert Huntley, the city’s water pollution control superintendent, said that the city measures its parameters and believe the high numbers are correct, conflicting with Vrebec’s statement that the company’s testing shows that its numbers aren’t as high as Rames is making them out to be.

Huntley added that the water pollution control plant is at high capacity already and has had difficulty communicating with Actus Nutrition in the past.

“We run on a razor’s edge already, when we try and figure out what they’re doing, what other companies are doing,” Huntley said.

Mayor Shane Clausen said Actus Nutrition has invested heavily in its facility, but the city and company need to get on the same level and find out what the actual BOD score is.

“Communication is so key. … We’re all working toward a solution,” Clausen said.

Vrebec said the goal is to put the facility treatment in its own area, providing that the company finds enough power. He said the company wants to have something in place in 16 months.

Rames said the anomalies, events that force the company to dump discharge, haven’t been clearly communicated to the city ahead of time.

“Those things need to be communicated so that we know what you’re doing,” Rames said, “(and) what are you doing over there so that we work with you and adjust our treatment system so we can handle that load.”

Ultimately, the proposed changes to the permits were tabled and a meeting will happen between the company and the city to find a compromise on what to do. They could bring something back to the city council within two weeks.