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Opponents concerned about Potash Corp.'s plans for a sulfur plant at Morehead port
Publisher's Note: This article originally appeared in the Beaufort Observer.
Potash Corp. is proposing a new sulfur-treatment plant at the State Port in Morehead. The plans have been developed in secret for the most part but have now caused an uproar in Carteret County. The issue could be a major one for Beaufort County. Some people suggest the sulfur plant is essential for the continued operation of the phosphate plant at Aurora. Others note that if the Morehead site is rejected, an alternative is to build the plant in Beaufort County.
Our partner print publication, the County Compass, is running a story in this week's edition that includes an explanation from Neal Littman, one of the leading opponents of the proposed Potash Corp. sulfur-treatment facility they are seeking to build at the State Port in Morehead City. In the article the County Compass quotes Mr. Littman saying: "PCS Phosphate thought this project was wired in advance with 'key players' and was good at making this project sound like an extension of their existing operations. It is NOT!! It is a chemical-processing facility NEW to North Carolina. It smells bad. There are serious health hazards. It is ugly and will have smokestacks towering twice the height of the high-rise bridge into, and out of, Morehead City."
When PCS approached Morehead City Yacht Basin several months ago, it was to seek approval for extension of their barge berth on Calico Creek "to improve material handling capacity related to their phosphate business...."
We tried to assist PCS in their expansion by discussing the channel limitations and the need to get input from the nearby U.S. Army berths where 175-foot vessels reside - all with much greater beam than the pleasure boats of our marina.
We met with the U.S. Army officials. They got the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers involved and we came to a mutual agreement as to the extent of the additional dredging that was needed.
At no point during this phase of conversation did PCS mention that they actually wanted to construct an industrial-chemical facility immediately adjacent to Morehead City Yacht Basin.
We found out when we received on Friday, July 1st (the start of the July 4th weekend) a very cryptic notice regarding a PCS Phosphate application for modification of an existing CAMA permit. It was impossible to tell from the notice what the scope of the proposed project would be.
I contacted the PCS Phosphate Senior Scientist to request a copy of the Environmental Assessment, as is our right. He e-mailed a copy to me. It was only then that I understood that PCS and the State Port were proposing a NEW INDUSTRIAL-CHEMICAL FACTORY.
To view the company's Environmental Assessment, click here (86 pages, 3.6MB).
We had subsequent conversations with their Senior Scientist and the PCS Director of Environmental Compliance. While Jet Matthews (president of the slip-owners association at our facility) and I were on a conference call with PCS officials, we learned that this process was new to PCS and new to the region.
PCS has NEVER operated any similar facility, but they do have experience handling molten sulfur here at the State Port and at Aurora in Beaufort County.
Molten sulfur is a different form of sulfur from what they are proposing to process. PCS wants to purchase sulfur in its dry form and have it transported to the State Port in bulk-cargo ships (much cheaper than buying the molten sulfur, which is commonly a by-product of refining petroleum) and then convert it to its molten state. This "phase change," or change in the state of the element sulfur, is what creates value for PCS.
For PCS, the minimum net-operating profit per ton for changing the form of sulfur from the dry state into the molten state is about $120 and may be as high as $600 per ton.
Since they are building sulfur melters with a daily capacity of 5,000 tons, this gives them a potential net-operating income of $600,000 per day on the low side and up to $3 million per day one the upper end. This is before amortizing the cost of the chemical factory, but that can be done with a small part of the income stream generated by the sulfur chemical plant.
Serious value is created by changing the state of the material. PCS will not easily give up that money. If you do a Google search for "cost of sulfur," you will gain a greater understanding about the economic incentives for PCS. They are considerable. What does Carteret County get? Nothing! Actually worse than nothing--bad smells, pollution and a considerable reduction in the tax base due to much lower property values.
Sulfur dust in its dry form is explosive. The company will be moving it around the State Port on conveyor belts. At each "transfer point," PCS says it will provide dust control by wetting down the dry sulfur so that the dust does not build up and become explosive.
Sulfur dust will be generated by every movement of the pelletized material throughout the State Port. The conveyor system cannot be made "airtight" as it has to allow for the venting of the hydrogen sulfide and sulfur dioxide gases that are naturally formed when sulfur is in contact with oxygen.
Some of the sulfur smells escape to the atmosphere, no matter what they do. Some sulfuric acid is formed, no matter what they do. PCS has considerable experience with accidents causing explosions and fires from sulfur dust.
Numerous examples exist at Aurora of fires caused by train-wheel contact with rails that have a dusting of sulfur. The worst industrial accident in North Carolina in the last century was caused by dust at the West Pharmaceuticals factory in Kinston. Similarly, Georgia's worst industrial accident was caused by dust in a sugar-refining facility.
A lot of dust will escape from the State Port. It is much finer than the dust from the wood-chip operation at the State Port and we have to deal with that debris every day in eastern Morehead City. It is a danger.
How does the State Port plan to prevent explosive dust from detonating the PETN explosives that the State Port periodically has present... and has previously spilled?
How can the State Port segregate the fire hazards of the chemical factory and the wood-chip operation? Does the State Port take into consideration protecting its neighbors and the larger community? We see no evidence of that in practice on a daily basis.
Air quality is addressed by trying to get this project in place before the U.S. EPA implementation of much more restrictive sulfur rules (which become effective on 1/1/2013) and by gaming how the airborne pollutants are measured.
To achieve even the lower standards now required, PCS design engineers measure the air concentration of pollutants at ground level at the fence line or boundary of the property and they discharge the airborne pollutants from the top of a smokestack that is 150 feet high!
The Morehead City-Beaufort High Rise Bridge is only about 75 feet high!
The PCS workers will all have to wear an electronic sniffer or chemical sensor that sounds an alarm if it detects the presence of hydrogen sulfide gas (which can very quickly kill a worker). At the Morehead City Yacht Basin, our marina has people sleeping on boats less than 150 feet from the boundary of the proposed industrial-chemical factory.
Click here to read the remainder of this week's article on the Compass News 360.
Go Back
Potash Corp. is proposing a new sulfur-treatment plant at the State Port in Morehead. The plans have been developed in secret for the most part but have now caused an uproar in Carteret County. The issue could be a major one for Beaufort County. Some people suggest the sulfur plant is essential for the continued operation of the phosphate plant at Aurora. Others note that if the Morehead site is rejected, an alternative is to build the plant in Beaufort County.
Our partner print publication, the County Compass, is running a story in this week's edition that includes an explanation from Neal Littman, one of the leading opponents of the proposed Potash Corp. sulfur-treatment facility they are seeking to build at the State Port in Morehead City. In the article the County Compass quotes Mr. Littman saying: "PCS Phosphate thought this project was wired in advance with 'key players' and was good at making this project sound like an extension of their existing operations. It is NOT!! It is a chemical-processing facility NEW to North Carolina. It smells bad. There are serious health hazards. It is ugly and will have smokestacks towering twice the height of the high-rise bridge into, and out of, Morehead City."
When PCS approached Morehead City Yacht Basin several months ago, it was to seek approval for extension of their barge berth on Calico Creek "to improve material handling capacity related to their phosphate business...."
We tried to assist PCS in their expansion by discussing the channel limitations and the need to get input from the nearby U.S. Army berths where 175-foot vessels reside - all with much greater beam than the pleasure boats of our marina.
We met with the U.S. Army officials. They got the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers involved and we came to a mutual agreement as to the extent of the additional dredging that was needed.
At no point during this phase of conversation did PCS mention that they actually wanted to construct an industrial-chemical facility immediately adjacent to Morehead City Yacht Basin.
We found out when we received on Friday, July 1st (the start of the July 4th weekend) a very cryptic notice regarding a PCS Phosphate application for modification of an existing CAMA permit. It was impossible to tell from the notice what the scope of the proposed project would be.
I contacted the PCS Phosphate Senior Scientist to request a copy of the Environmental Assessment, as is our right. He e-mailed a copy to me. It was only then that I understood that PCS and the State Port were proposing a NEW INDUSTRIAL-CHEMICAL FACTORY.
To view the company's Environmental Assessment, click here (86 pages, 3.6MB).
We had subsequent conversations with their Senior Scientist and the PCS Director of Environmental Compliance. While Jet Matthews (president of the slip-owners association at our facility) and I were on a conference call with PCS officials, we learned that this process was new to PCS and new to the region.
PCS has NEVER operated any similar facility, but they do have experience handling molten sulfur here at the State Port and at Aurora in Beaufort County.
Molten sulfur is a different form of sulfur from what they are proposing to process. PCS wants to purchase sulfur in its dry form and have it transported to the State Port in bulk-cargo ships (much cheaper than buying the molten sulfur, which is commonly a by-product of refining petroleum) and then convert it to its molten state. This "phase change," or change in the state of the element sulfur, is what creates value for PCS.
For PCS, the minimum net-operating profit per ton for changing the form of sulfur from the dry state into the molten state is about $120 and may be as high as $600 per ton.
Since they are building sulfur melters with a daily capacity of 5,000 tons, this gives them a potential net-operating income of $600,000 per day on the low side and up to $3 million per day one the upper end. This is before amortizing the cost of the chemical factory, but that can be done with a small part of the income stream generated by the sulfur chemical plant.
Serious value is created by changing the state of the material. PCS will not easily give up that money. If you do a Google search for "cost of sulfur," you will gain a greater understanding about the economic incentives for PCS. They are considerable. What does Carteret County get? Nothing! Actually worse than nothing--bad smells, pollution and a considerable reduction in the tax base due to much lower property values.
Sulfur dust in its dry form is explosive. The company will be moving it around the State Port on conveyor belts. At each "transfer point," PCS says it will provide dust control by wetting down the dry sulfur so that the dust does not build up and become explosive.
Sulfur dust will be generated by every movement of the pelletized material throughout the State Port. The conveyor system cannot be made "airtight" as it has to allow for the venting of the hydrogen sulfide and sulfur dioxide gases that are naturally formed when sulfur is in contact with oxygen.
Some of the sulfur smells escape to the atmosphere, no matter what they do. Some sulfuric acid is formed, no matter what they do. PCS has considerable experience with accidents causing explosions and fires from sulfur dust.
Numerous examples exist at Aurora of fires caused by train-wheel contact with rails that have a dusting of sulfur. The worst industrial accident in North Carolina in the last century was caused by dust at the West Pharmaceuticals factory in Kinston. Similarly, Georgia's worst industrial accident was caused by dust in a sugar-refining facility.
A lot of dust will escape from the State Port. It is much finer than the dust from the wood-chip operation at the State Port and we have to deal with that debris every day in eastern Morehead City. It is a danger.
How does the State Port plan to prevent explosive dust from detonating the PETN explosives that the State Port periodically has present... and has previously spilled?
How can the State Port segregate the fire hazards of the chemical factory and the wood-chip operation? Does the State Port take into consideration protecting its neighbors and the larger community? We see no evidence of that in practice on a daily basis.
Air quality is addressed by trying to get this project in place before the U.S. EPA implementation of much more restrictive sulfur rules (which become effective on 1/1/2013) and by gaming how the airborne pollutants are measured.
To achieve even the lower standards now required, PCS design engineers measure the air concentration of pollutants at ground level at the fence line or boundary of the property and they discharge the airborne pollutants from the top of a smokestack that is 150 feet high!
The Morehead City-Beaufort High Rise Bridge is only about 75 feet high!
The PCS workers will all have to wear an electronic sniffer or chemical sensor that sounds an alarm if it detects the presence of hydrogen sulfide gas (which can very quickly kill a worker). At the Morehead City Yacht Basin, our marina has people sleeping on boats less than 150 feet from the boundary of the proposed industrial-chemical factory.
Click here to read the remainder of this week's article on the Compass News 360.
| Sulfur processing plant stirring up a hornet's nest | News and Information, The Region | Appeals Court case may have implications for Beaufort County |
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