DNREC urged to reduce point-source pollution in Inland Bays

Environmentalists are urging state regulators to make Allen Harim LLC remove one of the last two remaining point sources of treated wastewater in the Inland Bays.

Representatives at the Delaware Center for the Inland Bays are calling on state environmental officials to force the poultry processing company to pull its pipes from Whartons Branch, a tributary of Indian River, and switch to land-based application for wastewater disposal. Treated wastewater and stormwater produced at the former - and now inactive - Vlasic pickle plant flows out of several pipes into the nearby creek off Iron Branch Road in Millsboro.

The center's Comprehensive Conservation and Management Plan, drafted in 1995, requires the elimination of all point-source discharges in the Inland Bays watershed, and prompted a resolution calling for an end to the use of the outfall. To date, 11 of 13 direct outfalls in the Inland Bays watershed have been taken offline.

The only other remaining pollution point source in the Inland Bays watershed is Rehoboth Beach Wastewater Treatment Plant, which is on track to pull its outfall pipes from the Lewes-Rehoboth Canal in 2018 in favor of an ocean outfall.

The resolution from the center's board of directors recommends the Department of Natural Resources and Environmental Control issue no new discharge permit for the plant unless the permit includes a plan and a timeline for moving to land-based treatment.

The plant's current permit expired more than three years ago. The permittee is still recorded as Pinnacle Foods, which shuttered the pickle plant in 2012. DNREC administratively extended the National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System, or NPDES, permit when it expired in October 2013; it was transferred to Allen Harim when the company purchased the site in September 2014.

In March 2015, Allen Harim applied for a new permit based on plans to convert the plant for poultry processing. Several months later, following court battles and outcries from nearby residents, the company abandoned the idea of processing 2 million chickens per week at the site and opted to use it instead as leased space for warehousing.

Since then, Allen Harim has not revised its NPDES permit application, said DNREC Secretary David Small. The warehouse now operates on the parameters outlined by the expired 2013 permit, which is based on the facility's use as a pickle plant.

“Our next step, quite frankly, is to ask them to get us an updated application that would reflect some type of use,” Small said at a Dec. 16 board meeting at the Center for the Inland Bays. He said moving forward with the permit application on file, which reflects use for poultry processing, would be a waste of everyone's time.

Small said it's unclear if Allen Harim plans to continue leasing the facility for warehousing, sell the property, or has a different future use in mind. He said he will contact Allen Harim to ask for a new application that reflects what the company plans to do at the site.

But center Executive Director Chris Bason questioned why the department hasn't issued a new permit, regardless of the company's future use plans.

“It seems to me the regulations are clear,” Bason said. “In the interim, until the facility figures out what they want to do, why would the department not issue a permit to say, for example, discharge the wastewater on the land?”

“That could be an outcome,” Small replied.

Small, who serves on the Center for the Inland Bays board, recused himself from voting on a resolution drafted by the board urging DNREC to use its regulatory authority to change how the plant disposes of its effluent. Board member Vickie York also abstained from voting.

Small said NPDES permits operate on a 5-year cycle. They may be administratively extended for a number of reasons.

“I should note that administratively extended NPDES permits are not uncommon in Delaware and around the country,” he said.

A permit extension ends when a new permit is issued; in some cases, that timeframe has exceeded a decade, Small said.

“Whether it's on the applicant end or whether it's on ... the agency end, which it has been in some cases where we just have not processed permits arguably in a timely way, those permit conditions just carry forward,” he said. “It's not as though they are operating without a permit.”

Small said the Millsboro site is contributing minor discharges, especially after it stopped accepting biosolids from Dogfish Head Craft Brewery. It's only being leased for warehousing.

“It's a small, but not an insignificant amount,” Bason said of the facility's most recent discharge data.

While the resolution comes with the support of scientists and engineers that serve on the center's board, DNREC is not required to listen to or act on the center's plea. The board requested that DNREC report back on the issue at the board's first meeting in 2017.

For more about the center and its Comprehensive Conservation and Management Plan, go to inlandbays.org.