03-23-1992 Council Packet - Laserfiche WebLink

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lai. ^ ■'*f* «•S'' lte»: W. " ' k<&; A^. m0 V, '■'i-Wiv, ‘‘ \j;x.. • S0''' :;i£V- a.<4* •V4. ®W-;fe" W*i.:.1%#'' K'"-fcf Star Tribune Established 1867 Roger Parkinson Potiiist>.‘'i and President Joel R. Kramer Executive Editor Tim J. McGuire Managing Editor Robert J. White Editorial Editor 12A Tuesday /August 21/1990 Healthy skepticism on turning ash to asphalt . . ____t____•____I___:.u rr*#(T!r-il L n#! limiic i<»\vn^nrnnlr Ciir scicnlIs tl safe to pave local roads with incinerator ash? That question should matter to every person who drives Minnesota’s highways or strolls its curb- sides. And until the answer i> plain, drivers and strollers should resist Hennepin County’s enthusi asm for turning ash from its downtown incinerator into asphalt. At this point, the plan to test the idea this year on a county road looks hasty and risky. The Minnesota Pollution Control Agency (MPCA) should defer it until public doubts are addressed. meet federal k.nd limits, townspeople cite scientific views that those limits may not be sunicicnl to protect health. /\s the road yields to trafTic and harsh ucalher. they fear, the asphalt could be ground into a lo.xic powder which could contami nate soils and waterways and which playing children might swallow and inhale. • At first glance, the ash-to-asphalt deal looks like a neat way to make tons of incinerator waste disap pear. That bit of magic depends on a Georgia firm. Municipal Services Corp.. that says it can change dangerous ash into innocuous pellets for use in road paving. To prove its ease, the company wants to test the ash-laccd .sphalt on a 1,000-fooi strip of County Rd. 81 ir .,yaylon. The two-year experi ment could be the first step toward paving other county roads — and ultimately, roads all over the state with ash pellets. The MPCA citizen board is scheduled to decide in late September whether to approve a permit for the project. The project ’s dcTci. rs insist that won’t happen, and that extensive tests will assure the experi- mcnl’s safety. I3ui several environmental groups have pointed to holes in the draft permit for the project; It prescribes no tests for measuring the amount and effects of dust that may wear off the road. It lacks a requirement, included in earlier drafts, that a sedimentation basin be built to monitor and contain runoff from the road. And the environmentalists criticize the experimenrs two-year time span — loo short a duration, they say. to determine \* hether the asphalt will hold up safely over time. Those concerns arc cchor 1 by 32^ state legislators, who have urged the MPCA to deny tl.c permit until the flaws arc fixed. All of this has made some of the folks in Davton fretful, and for good reason. They complain that the pellets slated for testing will include fly ash — smokestack residue which often contains hazard ous amounts of lead, cadmium and other heavy metals. Though the asphalt itself is expected to just County Commissioner Jeff Spartz shrugs off resis tance to the D.iyton test as another ease of the “NIMBY " (not in my back yard) syndrome. But Daytonians are right to insist that the lest — in which they will serve as guinea P TS — be both safe -ind thorough. Un*il that demand is met, skepti cism about p.-iving with ash is the best policy. 1 1 j i