Proposed solution for cleaning up Piney Point could cost $12 million and take eight years

Atlanta-based Nclear says it has the technology to clean up the environmental mess at the abandoned Piney Point phosphate plant.

But it will take time — about eight years — and money, about $12 million.

Michael Mies, chief executive officer of Nclear, told members of the Manatee County Port Authority on Thursday that his company had conducted a pilot program to test its technology at the Piney Point’s large holding ponds from July to November 2017.

The program, conducted in collaboration with the Florida Department of Environmental Protection and property owner HRK Holdings, was designed to prove that Nclear could meet government water discharge standards, Mies said.

The pilot program had to overcome several challenges, including Hurricane Irma in September 2017, but it ultimately proved effective in removing phosphates and nitrogen from samples taken from the ponds, Mies said. The phosphate plant is located across the highway from Port Manatee northeast of the intersection of Buckeye Road and U.S. 41.

“We have a very high degree of confidence that we can treat this water to standards that it can be discharged into Tampa Bay,” he said.

Nclear uses two types of technology to remove impurities in the water. One process creates a synthetic mineral that exerts a strong attraction for phosphates in the water. Those phosphates can then be recovered and recycled as fertilizer, he said.

The second technology converts ammonia in the water to nitrogen gas, and produces no negative byproducts, Mies said.

Manatee County commissioners sit as members of the Manatee County Port Authority. While they said they were fascinated by the science that Mies described, they said that a resolution of the problem rests with DEP and HRK Holdings.

“HRK and the state of Florida own this problem. The county does not own this problem. It is not a port issue,” said Commissioner Betsy Benac.

Commissioner Vanessa Baugh, chair of the port authority, agreed that Piney Point is a state and HRK problem, but that Piney Point is also a county issue.

“Piney Point is an accident waiting to happen,” Baugh said. “We are responsible to our residents. We need to know what is happening out there.”

Commissioner Priscilla Whisenant Trace said that if Nclear’s technology will do what Mies claims, she is fine if the state and HRK want to award the company a contract.

“We don’t have anything to say about it,” Trace said, although she allowed she would oppose an alternative solution: a deep-well injection.

Commissioner Carol Whitmore agreed: “Our intent is to listen to you today. Now it is up to you to convince HRK and the DEP to do this.

“I am glad to hear there us another solution. It was very interesting,” Whitmore said.

Under the proposal outlined by Mies, Nclear would build a plant at Piney Point that could treat 250,000 gallons of water a day. The project would be operated by HRK.

Estimated cost of the plant would be $3.35 million, and cost about $1 million a year to operate. It would take about eight years to treat all of the more than 600 million gallons of water in the Piney Point holding points.

The Piney Point fertilizer plant opened in 1966. In 2001, Mulberry Corp. filed bankruptcy and abandoned the plant. Later that year, the DEP had to release 10 million gallons of lime-treated water into the Gulf of Mexico after Tropical Storm Gabrielle hit the area.

Other spills followed. In 2004, hurricane winds knocked a hole in a dike at Piney Point, dumping 70 million gallons of contaminated water into local waterways. In 2011, the liner on one of the gypsum stacks at Piney Point began leaking, and 170 million gallons of contaminated water were released into Bishop Harbor and Tampa Bay.

Asked for comment on the Piney Point proposal, the DEP responded Thursday afternoon that HRK Holdings, LLC acquired ownership of the Piney Point site in August 2006 from the bankruptcy trustee of Piney Point Phosphates Inc.

“At that time, HRK also entered into an administrative agreement with the Department regarding its duties as owner of the phosphogypsum stack system at the site. HRK assumed responsibility for long term care at the site in 2011; which care includes responsibility for maintenance and monitoring of the closed phosphogypsum stack system, including management and disposal of the stored process water,” a DEP official said.

The department continues to provide regulatory oversight over to ensure that HRK is taking the actions necessary to meet its obligations at the site. HRK continues to operate process water management controls, and is currently operating spray evaporation systems to remove process water at the site. HRK is obligated to complete removal of the remaining excess process water which must ultimately be removed to complete closure of the phosphogypsum stack system. the DEP said in an email.

“DEP closely tracks the facility’s storage capacities to ensure that water levels do not pose a threat. While there is sufficient storage capacity today, ultimately, the volume of process water at the site must be reduced before the remaining lined storage ponds can be closed, permanently preventing the capture of additional rainwater in those ponds. Once the process water is removed from the lined storage ponds, the closure work can be completed. At that point, any subsequent rainfall runoff at the site will be able to be managed through the existing stormwater management system,” DEP said.

Prior to HRK assuming responsibility for the site in January 2011, $142 million had been spent to manage and remove over two billion gallons of process water and to complete the required closure construction activities that were needed following the site’s 2001 abandonment by the Mulberry Corporation, DEP said.

For more about Nclear, visit https://www.nclear.us/nclear.

This story was originally published March 21, 2019 at 4:24 PM.