Minutes - Public Works Committee - 04/20/2004

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Public Works Director Kapler replied some assumptions have to be made, but that was staff s thought. . Councilmember Elvig questioned what they are prepared to do about the situation. A year has been spent monitoring the odor. This plant is sitting along an industrial area and they are trying to make oil and water mix. Public Works Director Kapler reviewed that the last time this was discussed there was a representative from Commercial Asphalt present. The suggestion that made staff nervous was that one option was to produce more product in a shorter period of time. He noted the general neighborhood, with the exception of one or two people seem pretty tolerable to this, and if they raise the level of the odor it may raise the eyebrows of more people. Councilmember Elvig questioned how many days the level of the odor was in a range of 4 and 5, on a scale of I to 5. Public Works Supervisor replied during the regular year there may be five or six days out of the whole summer with the odor in the 4 and 5 range. of Commercial Asphalt, explained when the weather is cool, like the week they had the problem, what the plant operator was doing was making smaller batches to try to keep the product warm. During the last discussion he had suggested the plant has the capability for making a bigger batch so the plant runs a longer period of time, rather than starting and stopping. With the starting and stopping the bag house does not always stay warm enough to get everything up in the air to disperse. With the cold temperatures they proposed to run the equipment a longer period of time for production so the bag house would stay warm. Chairperson Zimmerman clarified this procedure would be more to keep the equipment warm than to put' out more product at one specific time. responded in the affirmative. He explained if they have an order of 1,000 tons they previously made 250 tons, which is about 20 to 30 truckloads, and then made another 250 tons. He proposed they would just make the whole batch up. By doing this the plant would stay warm, rather than reheating the plant. The other thing is this is one of ten plants they have, and in making asphalt they get complaints about odor, but he guarantees that 95 percent of those complaints are in the last two weeks of operation when the weather cools off. Public Works Director Kapler indicated Commercial Asphalt has been very pleasant to work with through this whole situation. Councilmember Cook commented he thinks one of the big problems is that odor does not necessarily mean a health risk. There can be something that is working very well and doing what it is supposed to do, but it still puts out a smell that is offensive to people. It is not likely anything would be done about an odor, other than work the plant the way it is meant to work. He agrees withCouncilmember Elvig in questioning why they would continue monitoring if they Public Works Committee! April 20, 2004 Page 3 of 16