Eastman Chemical Co.’s coal gasification facility in Kingsport, part of its Tennessee operations that cover more than 1,000 acres.
(Contributed)
Eastman facing sanction over spills
By Jeff KeelingPress Business Editor
jkeeling@johnsoncitypress.com
KINGSPORT — A global economic crisis wasn’t the only thing that troubled Eastman Chemical Co. over the past 18 months: The manufacturing giant also faces a governmental “enforcement order” related to a series of spills into the South Fork of the Holston River.
The accidental discharges — which drew the most attention when they caused fish kills last summer and fall — are out of character for the company, at least with respect to recent years, and they’ve got the Tennessee Department of Environment and Conservation keeping close watch.
“The (TDEC) Division of Water Pollution Control continues to monitor the Eastman issues closely,” TDEC’s Meg Lockhart said. TDEC has drafted an enforcement order that, upon approval by the federal Environmental Protection Agency, will be issued to Eastman and likely involve monetary fines.
The head of Eastman’s environmental affairs department, Richard Strang, said the company has worked hard for decades to be a good environmental steward. The difficulties of the last couple years — and particularly three large discharges that occurred July 28, Aug. 12 and Oct. 26 last year — have carried a particular sting, as Eastman was receiving environmental accolades around the same time.
Those accidents released 15,230 pounds of triethylene phosphate and other phosphates per discharge in July and August, and both acetic acid (2,200 gallons) and terephthalic acid (13,000 pounds) on Oct. 26.
“I can’t help but take these accidental discharges personally,” Strang said last week. “We’ve worked so hard to improve the health of the river. Our goal is to have zero accidental discharges, and we’ve strived to do that... Some of the discharges were from burst pipes, and the accidents, it’s very hard to predict they would happen.”
Strang said Eastman already has thoroughly investigated all the accidental discharges, as it does with all such incidents.
“We assemble all the people that have knowledge of what happened and we look for the root cause. Then we assign action items to take care of the problem to make sure it doesn’t happen again.”
“I wish I could sit here today and tell you we will have no more accidental discharges in the future, but given the nature of the events we’ve experienced I can’t promise that.”
The company had eight spills in 2009, and seven the year before. That compares to a total of seven spills in the four preceding years — three in 2004, one in 2005, two in 2006 and one in 2007.
TDEC’s Lockhart, who described Eastman as having “generally been a cooperative and compliant NPDES permit holder,” said enforcement orders typically start with initial enforcement requests from TDEC field offices. Eastman is covered by the Johnson City field office. NPDES stands for National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System, which started in 1972 with passage of the federal Clean Water Act.
Initial enforcement decisions “are made based on the circumstances of the releases, including magnitude and apparent impact,” Lockhart said.
“In general, a pattern of non-compliance is the trigger, but typically not more than a period of two years.”
Lockhart said civil enforcement actions are meant “to bring about compliance and prevent environmental harm.” The majority of a penalty is usually applied as “contingent penalties,” meaning those fines can be waived if the offender takes corrective actions within a certain time, but Lockhart said “there will almost be an amount due and payable up front.”
Eastman’s NPDES permit allows it to release treated wastewater into the river from what is called “outfall 002,” and untreated cooling water from throughout its operations from “outfall 001.”
Strang said outfall 001 “should not have any pollutants in it whatsoever. When we have an accidental discharge, because that cooling water network runs throughout the plant, that’s the avenue that accidental discharges can take to get to the river.”
He said that thanks to water quality improvements over the past several decades — the section of the river passing Eastman was taken off TDEC’s impaired streams list in 2006 — many species of fish now thrive in the river, and some of them are attracted to the warmer water that comes out of outfall 001.
It happened to be their bad luck during the three large spills, but Strang and fellow environmental affairs staffer Tim Musick both say the chemicals involved dissipated quickly in a river that brings 1.7 billion gallons flowing past Eastman on a typical day.
In October, for instance, the acetic acid entering the water was undiluted and in the minutes after the spill killed “fish that were attracted to the outfall” by increasing the water’s acidity level in the immediate area.
After an hour, pH levels were back to normal at the outfall, and Strang said acetic acid and TPA both are “extremely biodegradable.” The same is true for the phosphates released in July and August, he said.
TDEC’s Lockhart, too, said “these effects ... appeared to be of short duration and in a limited area near the Eastman outfall point.”
Strang said he doesn’t recall any past enforcement orders from TDEC based on Eastman violating its NPDES permit. With the unfortunate frequency of discharges in 2008 and 2009, he said, he understands why one is coming.
“It’s part of the process, and we want to be regulated, we want to have permits, we want to have reporting and monitoring requirements. And if we have accidents and non-compliance, we want to be enforced on. That’s how the system works.”