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Nursery Products' Sludge Facility

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August 20, 2009 9:20 AM

Nursery Products LLC is still trying to get their proposed compost/sludge facility west of Hinkley okayed through the county and Helphinkley is still fighting them. But Helphinkley.org can’t do this alone. The residents of Barstow, Daggett, Yermo, Newberry Springs, Helendale, and non-member Helphinkley Hinkley residents need to help. Do you really want this facility in your backyard? This facility will detrimentally impact our air, water, health, harm the habitat of wildlife, cause traffic problems on State Hwy. 58, and possibly be a fire hazard. You must help!

The Supplemental Environmental Impact Report (SEIR) is out now. The judge here in Barstow required that Nursery Products go back and redo several points in the original EIR. These points were supposed to cover the issues of a water source for this facility and the economic feasibility of enclosing this facility. Nursery Products says there is enough water (from a well) — 1,000 gallons/day! They will have to drill a well and this water will be coming from our water supply to wet down compost piles to produce a compost product that Nursery Products says they have a market for (do we actually know this as fact?). On the issue of the feasibility of enclosing this facility to better protect the environment and our health Nursery Products says it is not economically feasible to cover this large facility. Why does it have to be so large? Who’s sludge/green waste are they using in their composting? Not ours! The sludge/green waste will be trucked in from LA and other areas.

You have until September 13 to comment on the SEIR. To read the SEIR go to the county website — http://www.co.san-bernardino.ca.us/landuseservices/Public%20Notices/EIRs/Nursery%20Products%207-09/1-Draft%20SEIR%20Nursery%20Products%20Hawes%20Composting%20Facility.pdf or read the copy at the Barstow Branch Library or the Hinkley Senior Center. Please send your comments and/or questions to Carrie Hyke, Principal Planner, Advance Planning Division, 385 N. Arrowhead Ave., First Floor, San Bernardino, Ca 92415-0182.

Joan Bird

Hinkley

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14 comments

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maureenreilly

1:49 PM on August 20, 2009

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Read the draft Environmental Impact Report:
It still isn't clear where the water would come from to wet the piles, to keep down the dust, to wash the gooey sludge off the departing trucks, to provide sanitation for the workers and drivers, and wet the finished compost stored on site to keep it from blowing offsite.

The proposed site is smack in the middle of what is supposed to be Desert Tortoise restoration lands...where the endangered Desert Tortoise is supposed to breed and recreate themselves back into sustainable numbers. However, the bacteria blowing off the sludge will increase the great cause of death among Desert Tortoise - mycoplasma pneumonia.

see: Infectious diseases and pathology of reptiles By Elliott R. Jacobson

Nursery Products states again in this supplemental Environmental Impact Report that they do not intend to compost according to the windrow compost requirements. They do not intend to always turn the piles of sludge 5 times - as required by the state and federal sludge compost regulations.

Maureen Reilly
Sludge Watch

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deserthomeowner

7:13 PM on August 20, 2009

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When Nursery Products first tried to place a composting facility in Newberry Springs, no one from Hinkley cared or offered to help that community. Thank god Newberry Springs through shear determination managed to get Nursery Products to back off. When Nursery Products set their sites on Hinkley, the residents of Hinkley refused to take any advice from Newberry Springs. Now that the Nursery Products facility has gained a strong footing in Hinkley, the some of the residents of Hinkley are now crying for help. It seems not enough residents of Hinkley really care to stop Nursery Products. Seems the real goal for Hinkley is to wait for the ground water to be contaminated and then sue for big bucks. That they have a lot of experience at doing.

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barstowcob

10:22 PM on August 20, 2009

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The sky is falling, the sky is falling! You people really need to learn about what you are talking about. My BS is in Environmental Geology with a MS in Geochemistry and I really have no problem with this facility. Unless I am missing something you are just NIMBYs.

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barstowsteve

7:14 AM on August 21, 2009

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BarstowCob what you are missing is that Nursery Products is already proven to be a bad actor. They were thrown out of Adelanto for being a public health hazard. Only in San Bernardino County would a company with as bad a history as Nursery Products would be rewarded for their past acts by being allowed to open a facility ten times bigger than the last.

Deserthomeowner you have accidentally hit on the problem with Hinkley, they have now CSD or other governing facility to actively fight the county on this facility like Newberry CSD did. I imagine if it got to the point where if Newberry needed the support of the Hinkley folks they would have helped anyway they can.

Also Deserthomeowner do not be too comfortable, the land Nursery Products bought for the Newberry Springs is still in their possession, nd as Jeff Meberg said in a deposition in the Adelanto case, there is no market for their composted sewage sludge so the will need a place to store the stuff when they run out of room in Hinkley so keep an eye out.

The whole of the High Desert is under threat from this facility and we have no advocate in the county so we have to stick together.

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ulrichs92311

8:54 AM on August 21, 2009

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The Nursery Products facility can only recycle one third of what the Inland Empire generates and it will save big money for high desert waste water plants that we ALL need.

Joan-any parcel owner can legally pump 10 times what Nursery Products says they are going to pump. I just called MWA and confirmed it.

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jsbittles

12:35 PM on August 21, 2009

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Anybody reading these posts, please listen to people like BarstowCob who have scientific knowledge and truely knows what they are talking about. DO NOT listen to people like BarstowSteve, Maureen Reilly who continue to try and scare everybody with untrue facts. They are simply NIMBY's, and are totally mis-informing the public to scare them and get them on their side. The site is 8 Miles away from Hinkley and 22 miles away from Barstow, it's certainly not on anybody's doorstep. This project will help save the public tax dollars.

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silverthistle

4:30 PM on August 21, 2009

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isbittles, exactly how will this project save tax dollars?

This sludge facility is poison! One would have to be blind to believe otherwise. The science on sewer sludge is everywhere! Reports by Cornell University to the National Academy of Sciences, and everyone inbetween.

Here is part of a report by the Associated Press:

Cattle killed by chemicals in fertilizer?
Judge rules in favor of farmers challenging waste water recycling program
By John Heilprin and Kevin S. Vineys
The Associated Press
updated 2:40 p.m. PT, Thurs., March. 6, 2008
AUGUSTA, Ga. - It was a farm idea with a big payoff and supposedly no downside: ridding lakes and rivers of raw sewage and industrial pollution by converting it all into a free, nutrient-rich fertilizer.

Then last week, a federal judge ordered the Agriculture Department to compensate a farmer whose land was poisoned by sludge from the waste treatment plant here. His cows had died by the hundreds.

The Associated Press also has learned that some of the same contaminants showed up in milk that regulators allowed a neighboring dairy farmer to market, even after some officials said they were warned about it.

In one case, according to test results provided to the AP, the level of thallium — an element once used as rat poison — found in the milk was 120 times the concentration allowed in drinking water by the Environmental Protection Agency.

The contaminated milk and the recent ruling by U.S. District Judge Anthony Alaimo raise new doubts about a 30-year government policy that encourages farmers to spread millions of tons of sewage sludge over thousands of acres each year as an alternative to commercial fertilizers.

The program is still in effect.

Alaimo ordered the government to compensate dairy farmer Andy McElmurray because 1,730 acres he wanted to plant in corn and cotton to feed his herd was poisoned. The sludge contained levels of arsenic, toxic heavy metals and PCBs two to 2,500 times federal health standards.

Also, data endorsed by Agriculture and EPA officials about toxic heavy metals found in the free sludge provided by Augusta's sewage treatment plant was "unreliable, incomplete, and in some cases, fudged," Alaimo wrote.

COMPOSTING SLUDGE DOES NOT REMOVE THE HEAVY METALS, PCB'S, TOXINS, ETC. THE WATER TABLE WILL BECOME CONTAMINATED, THE WINDS WILL BLOW THIS STUFF EVERYWHERE, THE PLANTS WILL BECOME TOXIC AND POISON ANYTHING THAT EATS THEM.

AND THIS IS OK BECAUSE ONE MAN WANTS TO MAKE A PROFIT?

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jsbittles

7:37 PM on August 21, 2009

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Firstly, the site is a composting site, it will not spread raw sludge on crops or farmers dairy fields. So you don’t need to be worried that you will be poisoned by the milk at the store. The site is going to produce a Class A compost, which has to meet strict heavy metal and contaminant criteria set out by the EPA. Composting DOES remove PCB’s, you can go online and learn all about PCB composting. The water table is too low to be contaminated by anything, and the sludge is too sticky to blow anywhere. The compost they will be producing is so safe that companies such as Miracle Gro stick it in a bag for you and your family to grow your plants and hey its even sold at Home Depot! Many open air compost facilities around the country compost sludge very successfully without causing any harm to the public.

As ulrich92311 stated this will save the high desert waste water plants lots of money. This facility is privately owned and operated and will not require tax dollars to pay for it.

Take a look at this website and all the benefits to composting, and compost. It even mentions composting biosolids. http://www.everydayhealth.com/healthy-home/eco-friendly/composting-101.aspx

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barstowsteve

8:37 PM on August 21, 2009

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By all means don't listen to me or Maureen please do your own research, Might want to research the Victorville Daily Press stories on the Adelanto site. Research how the sticky sludge blew over so much crap to a nearby LA DWP site that the DWP sued Nursery Products. Also don't forget to look up the local judge that shut down the Adelanto site for being a public health hazard.

While you are at it look up Millawaukee sewage sludge debacle or the Augusta Georgia mess mess. Then look up sludge and heavy metals.

While you are in a researching mood look me up. I have a number of non-sludge articles in the Dispatch archives. You can also find me at the Mojave River Valley Museum, Barstow High School alumni page class of 84, and also you can find me at the Main Street Mural Tours {October tour should be fun we are doing it in a horse and carriage.}

When you done with all that ask yourself have I ever lied to you aboutanything? And then ask yourself "who is jsbittles or barstowcob?"

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jsbittles

10:07 PM on August 21, 2009

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If you read some of BarstowSteve’s letters, you will find that they are FULL of untrue/incorrect statements – especially his August 5th letter to the editor. I was amazed that an editor would post a letter with so many incorrect statements, but we stand on that great constitutional right of free speech – even when its false information being given. BarstowSteve, I really do not need to know who you are to know that the majority of your facts about this facility are totally incorrect. When sludge is composted to a Class A product there are many, many benefits that it has to offer to mother nature. The Adelanto facility was close to neighbors, the new site is not. It is 8 miles away from Hinkley and 22 miles away from Barstow, you would never know its there. This facility will bring jobs to locales. There are thousands of people that work at wastewater treatment plants around the country who deal with sludge on a daily basis, many of those workers work at our plant in Barstow – are they sick, NO. Ask yourself the question, if this facility is so bad for the public why are so many in operation today? And if sludge is so bad, why do so many people work at treatment plants, and not get sick?