Jore Corporation works with EPA to resolve spill concerns
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RONAN — Jore Corporation intends to cooperate fully with the Environmental Protection Agency to resolve environmental concerns currently being monitored at its Ronan plant, officials said last week.
On August 1, a 21-day public comment period began for a proposed agreement between the EPA and Jore Corporation to investigate and make improvements to the plant after the agency last summer found improper “handling of solid waste which may present an imminent and substantial endangerment to health or the environment.”
The problems stem from an anonymous complaint filed with the EPA last year, according to director of engineering at Jore Corporation Kevin Torgenrud. Investigators for the EPA who arrived unannounced at the plant last summer found empty barrels that contained residue of mineral oil and other chemicals used in the process of making power tool accessories. Snow and rain mixed with the oil and spilled out onto the concrete parking lot.
According to EPA documents, the oil and water could have posed a threat to the nearby soil. The agency was also concerned about levels of hydrocarbons found in the facility’s containment pond and whether or not they pose a threat to nearby livestock or waterfowl.
Torgenrud said the facility is designed for all contaminants to run into the system of canals and containment ponds lined with PVC to protect the soil and environment. Unless the PVC is breached, Jore Corporation believes the canals and pond, which have filters to separate oil from water underneath, are safe, Torgenrud said. Nonetheless, the EPA investigation spurred Jore Corporation to take action to improve its system by installing taller rubber stops that will better contain spills in the future. The oil barrels have also been removed from the parking lot, although a dark black stain shows where they used to leak.
“We chose, as good corporate citizens, to cooperate fully with the EPA and investigators instead of fighting them in a legal battle,” Torgenrud said. “The primary reason we did that is that we’re local and we live here. We recreate here and we want to ensure everything is done correctly to ensure our environment is kept pristine.”
Jore Corporation also completed a spill prevention and control plan they didn’t know they needed to have on hand when the EPA inspected the facility last year.
“Our federal legislature seems to think it is ‘okey dokey’ to pass 15,000 or 16,000 new laws to the books each year, and it’s kind of hard to keep up,” Torgenrud said.
Working with the EPA benefited the company overall, according to Torgenrud.
“All of these things are real pluses and we are 100 percent for them,” he said. “We’ve been making a real significant investment of both time and money to try and get these installations done. These aren’t because we’ve done anything, these are just in case something bad should happen.”
The EPA investigation is not related to a separate environmental case being monitored by the Montana Department of Environmental Quality. Jore Corporation has until December 31 of this year to submit (clean) water samples from a well that provides drinking water to employees and the facility’s cafeteria, according to Shelley Nolan, water supply program manager for DEQ. Last year, the well was found to have levels of arsenic that exceeded state limits for more than three consecutive quarters in 2012.
Torgenrud said the company immediately installed a filter to remove the naturally occurring arsenic, but later argued with the DEQ about which company should have installed it.
Several months and $8,000 extra dollars later, Jore Corporation ended up with the same type of filter from a specialized environmental firm approved by the DEQ for such installations.
The water’s arsenic levels have been below state guidelines since the filters were installed, Nolan said.
“There have been no bad samples,” Nolan said. “They’re good from what I can see.”
