By Susan Young, Bangor Daily News

DEP decides not to reclassify HoltraChem mercury

While more than 80 tons of mercury sit in the now-shuttered HoltraChem Manufacturing Co. plant in Orrington, the Maine Department of Environmental Protection has refused a request to change its designation of the toxic heavy metal as a hazardous waste.

Stung by India's refusal to accept a shipment of mercury from the Orrington plant, an out-of-state chemical wholesale company had asked the state to classify the metal, which was used to make chlorine, as a commodity so it would be easier to transport and sell it.

"Nobody around the world considers it a hazardous waste except the state of Maine," Donald Goldsmith, president of D.F. Goldsmith Chemical and Metal Corp., said of the mercury.

The DEP cannot classify the HoltraChem mercury as a commodity under state law because it was used in a manufacturing process. State officials say that the mercury left over from the process is not the same as the mercury that was originally brought on site.

"Once it is [no longer] used for its intended purpose on the site, it is a hazardous waste," said Scott Whittier, director of the DEP's Division of Hazardous Materials Regulation.

Changing the mercury's designation would require that the Legislature change state law.

Whittier sent a letter Thursday morning informing the mercury dealer, D.F. Goldsmith in Evanston, Ill., of the department's decision.

"We're not going to change our position on the regulated status of that mercury," Whittier said Thursday afternoon. He acknowledged that Maine was in the minority with its hazardous waste designation but that some other states have similar regulations.

Goldsmith, whose company has purchased nearly 50 tons of mercury from HoltraChem and planned to buy the remaining 80 tons, said earlier this week that the change in designation could help the state of Maine.

The change, he said, would allow HoltraChem to raise some much-needed money. The company has said it does not have the financial resources to begin cleaning up the facility, where the ground and water is thought to be contaminated with mercury, a known neurotoxin, and other chemicals.

The change in designation would also make it easier for the remaining mercury to leave Maine, Goldsmith said.

"Legally, if it is hazardous waste, we can't take it," Goldsmith said from his vacation home in Florida. "If it's mercury, we have a contract. We'll take it."

The DEP's Whittier said the classification of the mercury as a hazardous waste does not mean that no one will take it but that it will cost more to handle and ship it.

Three shipments of mercury have left the Orrington plant. They were treated as a hazardous waste, which means the mercury was placed in licensed containers, which were hauled away by a licensed waste hauler and the movement of the shipment was fully documented, Whittier said. The mercury contained in the shipments was handled by Mercury Waste Solutions of Albany, N.Y.

Two shipments were sold to other companies in the United States.

One shipment of 18 tons of mercury was put on a ship destined for India, where it was to be used in medical instruments and other manufacturing processes. After U.S. environmentalists contacted their counterparts in India, pressure was put on the government to refuse the shipment and the country's dock workers union refused to handle the cargo. Government officials said they would not accept the mercury because it is a hazardous waste. India is the largest importer of used mercury from the United States.

The mercury was taken off the ship in Egypt and is said to be headed back to this country.

"I'm not sure where it is right now," said John Bullock, an attorney for Goldsmith.

He said the company was making arrangements for the mercury to come back to America. When it comes back, it will go to Bethlehem Apparatus, the world's largest mercury recycler in Hellertown, Pa., if the Maine DEP still considers it a hazardous waste, Bullock said. If it is not classified as a hazardous waste, it will go to Goldsmith's facility in Illinois, before being sold to other companies.

Goldsmith said that the returning mercury will not come back to Maine.

"I can assure you of two things," he said. "It is not going to India and it is not going to Maine."

Last month, the manager of Mercury Waste Solutions said he would not accept any more mercury from HoltraChem because of the problems it had caused him.

Bullock called the HoltraChem mercury-politically contaminated."

"It's a bigger pain than anyone wants to touch," he said.

Goldsmith said this whole brouhaha over the mercury is unfortunate because it is a commodity that is in demand and if mercury like that from HoltraChem cannot be re-used, more mercury will have to be mined in places like Kyrgyzstan.

While changing the mercury's designation was not a possibility, Whittier said people were right to be concerned about the continued storage of mercury at the HoltraChem plant, which has been closed since October, particularly because the company's financial condition is questionable.

"Someday there won't be anyone there," he said.

In an effort to facilitate the disposal of mercury like that from HoltraChem, U.S. Sen. Susan Collins introduced federal legislation Thursday that would set up a task force to develop ways to permanently dispose of the toxic heavy metal.

The primary focus of the bill is to ban the sale of mercury-containing thermometers, but the measure also seeks to address the problem of mercury disposal. It directs the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to ensure that all the mercury collected when consumers trade in old thermometers for newer digital ones is -properly stored to keep it out of the environment and out of commerce.

"This mercury will not re-enter the environment, and it will not be sent to India," Collins, a Republican, said in introducing her bill Thursday on the floor of the U.S. Senate. The bill is now co-sponsored by Democrat John Kerry of Massachusetts, and others are expected to sign on.

The bill would also create an inter-agency task force, to be chaired by the administrator of the EPA, which would be charged with looking for long-term means of disposing of mercury, including that from chlor-alkali plants like HoltraChem and that held by the U.S. Department of Defense.

Last year, Maine Gov. Angus King and then EPA Administrator Carol Browner asked then-Defense Secretary William Cohen to take the HoltraChem mercury and add it to the 4,000-ton stockpile of the metal maintained by his agency. That request was denied because federal law prohibits the defense department from accepting mercury that it does not own unless that mercury poses an imminent threat to human health.

Collins' bill would require that the task force report to Congress in a year with recommendations for permanently disposing of mercury and for taking mercury from industrial sources out of circulation as well as for reducing the amount of mercury that is mined.

While the bill may come too late to solve the HoltraChem problem, it is a "significant development," said Michael Belliveau of the Natural Resources Council of Maine. "It puts us on a fast track to solving the HoltraChem-type problem looming out there," he said.

There are 10 other similar plants that are likely to shut down in the near future. They have 3,000 tons of mercury on hand.