By Erin Smith
Bladen County’s leadership is voicing support for Chemours, in comments that were emailed to the North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality (NC DEQ).
The comments were submitted as part of a proposed court order issued on June 11, which requires Chemours Fayetteville Works, to implement measures to either reduce or eliminate air emissions and water discharges which contain the chemical GenX. The comment period closed on July 11, and the Department of Environmental Quality has now made the comments publicly available on their website at (https://files.nc.gov/ncdeq/GenX/Chemours-Draft-Order-Public-Comments-Final-071218.pdf).
Bladen County Manager Greg Martin wrote in his email to the NC DEQ, that Chemours is an important industry for Bladen County as it employs several hundred people at their Fayetteville Works location. Martin noted that wastewater discharges into the Cape Fear River have ceased, and the company is investing more than $100 million for improvements which will greatly improve the quality of air emissions at the facility.
Four members of the Bladen County Board of Commissioners also submitted letters of support to DEQ. They were Commissioner Daniel Dowless, Commissioner Charles Ray Peterson, Chairperson Ray Britt, and Commissioner David Gooden.
Commissioner Dowless wrote, “The Company has worked to create a safe and clean environment for their employees and our community, and has agreed to spend over $100 million to build an on-site incinerator to capture and eliminate over 99 percent of their wastewater and air emissions.” You can read his comments in their entirety here.
Commissioner Gooden wrote, “Closing the plant would be devastating to our entire region and tragic for the families of the employees. These are some of the best jobs in our community.” You can read his comments in their entirety here.
Bladen County Commissioner Chairman Ray Britt wrote, that “Significant progress is being made by Chemours every day to mitigate these effects. They are no longer dumping water into the Cape Fear River and have cut back significantly on air emissions.”
Britt continued that he would like to see the NC DEQ give Chemours the time necessary to address the installation of all of the state-of-the-art technology requested by the NC DEQ. You can read his comments in their entirety here.
Marie Edwards, Clerk of the Bladen County Board of Commissioners wrote, “I know that we are dealing with safety, welfare, safe water, jobs, property tax income, families’ livelihoods, etc.
I would like to request that DEQ allow Chemours time to implement their plan with the addition of scrubbers for their steam stacks, filtration systems for neighboring households and the upfit of the plant to be state-of-the-art using cutting edge technology.”
The Bladen County Board of Commissioners comments seem to be far outweighed by those demanding the NC DEQ to take action against Chemours; some comments, which did not contain signatures or names, called for the closure of Chemours.
Paul Sommers of Wilmington wrote that “Chemours should have to reimburse the Cape Fear Public Utility Authority for their efforts to remove GenX from its water system. He also wrote, “Chemours should also be held accountable for any ill health effects experienced by those who have been exposed to GenX.”
Joe Adamsky announced his support of the NC DEQ’s proposed court order against Chemours.
Many more comments were written expressing serious concerns about Chemours’ actions, and fully supporting the NC DEQ for taking legal action to stop Chemours from further releasing GenX into the environment.
While officials review the comments and other data gathered to determine what next steps will be taken, Chamber notified the NC DEQ of a wastewater spill that occurred at the facility on July 13th that may potentially have contained dimer acid. The incident reported was indicated to have involved Waste Water Retention Tank No. 2.
The email from Dianne Fields with Chemours indicates the company removed the contaminated soil involved, and will dispose of it at an out-of-state waste disposal location.
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